IAPA calls for speed-up in trying defendants in Brazilian newsman murder

On February 2 the IAPA urged the Brazilian government and courts, through the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, to take action to ensure that those accused in connection with the 1997 murder of Ronaldo Santana de Araújo do not continue to have their trial delayed. The IAPA’s request was in response to an appeal lodged by the former mayor of Eunápolis, Bahia state, Paulo Dapé, accused of being the alleged mastermind of the murder, and his colleagues María José Ferreira Souza (a.k.a. María Sindoiá), Waldemir Batista de Oliveira (known as Dudu) and Antônio Oliveria Santos (Toninho da Caixa), also charged in the case and who are seeking to delay legal proceedings. In 2000, three years after the October 9, 1997 murder, the IAPA submitted the case of Araújo, an announcer with Rádio Jornal in Eunápolis, to the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights, which has been following it up since then. Convicted on November 22, 2002 of having carried out the murder and sentenced to 19 years and six months in prison was Paulo Sérgio Mendes, who escaped in 2008.