A motion for an interlocutory injunction was brought to prevent the City of Toronto from enforcing its By-law that prohibited camping and erecting tents, structures, and shelters in City parks, City of Toronto Municipal Code, c. 608. The applicants did not challenge the validity of the By-law but sought an order to have it suspended …Read more

The applicants appealed a decision affirming the constitutionality of Brian’s Law (Mental Health Legislative Reform), 2000, S.O. 2000, c. 9. (“Brian’s Law”), which was enacted by the Ontario legislature in 2000. Brian’s Law amended the Mental Health Act (“MHA”), adding provisions that expanded criteria for involuntary committal in a psychiatric hospital and introduced community treatment …Read more

The applicants’ claim was based on s. 27(1)(b) of the Constitution – the right to sufficient food and water, which they submitted found further expression in the provisions of the Water Services Act 108 of 1997 (“WSA”). Their complaint argued that farm occupiers and labour tenants, especially the applicants, lacked “access to sufficient water, basic …Read more

The applicant, Mr. Slavko Krajnc, was a professional truck driver in Celje, Slovenia. On September 29, 2003, Krajnc was deemed to have “category III work-related disability” as a result of his epilepsy, which rendered him unable to work as a truck driver. Accordingly, he had the right to be assigned to a different, more suitable …Read more

This case deals with the destruction of the Mayan community of Río Negro by a series of massacres perpetrated by the Guatemalan army and members of the civil self-defence patrols in 1980 and 1982 which, according to the IACmHR, included the persecution and elimination of members of the Mayan community, subsequent violations directed against the …Read more

This case was an appeal of a constitutional protection (amparo) action before the Constitutional Court filed by the claimant, Carlos Alexander Molina Garrido, against the Ministry of National Defense. The claimant was dismissed from military service after a report that he was drunk in public, which he appealed before the Ministry. When his administrative appeal …Read more

This case was an appeal of a constitutional protection (amparo) action before the Constitutional Court filed by the Public Defender of Human Rights, acting on behalf of Maritza Ninnette Cuellar Morales, against the Board of Directors of the Guatemalan Social Security Administration. The Board denied the claimant medical coverage for her spinal condition, based on …Read more

This case was an appeal of a constitutional protection (amparo) action before the Constitutional Court filed by the Public Defender of Human Rights, acting on behalf of Luisa Fernanda Morales Tumax, against the Board of Directors of the Guatemalan Institute of Social Security. The patient, a minor, received a kidney transplant in 2000, when she …Read more

This case was an unconstitutionality action brought by the Guatemalan Association of Pharmacists and Chemists et al. challenging the Liberalization of Importation of Medicines Act. The claimants argued that the Act’s elimination of requirements for imported medicines such as expiration dates, instructions in Spanish, and required government testing violated constitutional competition provisions, intellectual property and …Read more

This case was an appeal of a constitutional protection (amparo) action before the Constitutional Court filed by the Public Defender of Human Rights, acting on behalf of Maria Gabriela Garcia Fernandez, against the Board of Directors of the Guatemalan Social Security Administration. The Board denied the claimant medical coverage for her juvenile diabetes and chronic …Read more

The claimant, the Public Defender for Human Rights, brought a protection action on behalf of Maynor Wilfredo Cardenas Morales against the Guatemalan Institute of Social Security for its failure to provide the patient with the drugs Rapamune and Cellcep, as prescribed for his kidney transplant. The drugs were not included on the Therapeutic Drug Registry, …Read more

This case concerned a petition received by the Inter-American Commission on Human Rights (“IACHR”) from the Workers’ Pension Plan Association of the Banco Nacional de Desarrollo Agricola (National Agricultural Development Bank) (BANDESA). The petition was brought on behalf of 179 former BANDESA workers against the Republic of Guatemala. The petitioners alleged that the State of …Read more

Richard Solórzano Contreras was stabbed in the neck near his home in Guatemala from where his brother rushed him to the state hospital. Solórzano Contreras’s father, the petitioner, alleged that at the hospital the doctor and nurses did not perform any operations to try to save his son’s life. Rather, they “merely cleaned the wound, …Read more

In July 1998, two sons were in a car crash from which they suffered serious injuries and needed to undergo several surgical procedures.  Their father brought a case against the state of Guatemala. In March 1999, criminal and civil charges were filed against the drivers of the two vehicles under domestic Guatemalan law, leading to a …Read more

The petitioner, the Guatemala Chamber of Commerce, filed a petition challenging the constitutionality of Articles 3, 4 and 6 of the Law for the Creation of Tobacco Smoke Free Environments, which prohibited smoking in any enclosed space except for hotels and motels and established pecuniary penalties for offenders. The petitioner claimed that the challenged provisions …Read more

Julio César Bravo Villata, a minor, was a beneficiary of the Guatemalan Social Security Institute.  He suffered from cerebral paralysis due to a respiratory arrest that occurred at the time of birth (a “congenital defect”) and his parents were told that once the child turned five, his treatment would be suspended. The Board of Directors …Read more

This case was filed by the Human Rights Ombudsman of Guatemala acting on behalf of patients who suffer from vitiligo, psoriasis, fungoid mycosis, alopecia, lichen planus, uremic pruritus, and sclerodermas, against the Board of Directors of the Guatemalan Social Security Institute. He argued that the patients were informed that the company that was providing services …Read more

Petitioners, Luis Rolando Cuscul Pivaral and 38 others living with HIV/AIDS, alleged violations of Articles 4 (life), 8 (fair trial), 24 (equal protection), 25 (judicial protection), 26 (progressive development of economic, social and cultural rights) in conjunction with rights referred to in Article 1(1) of the American Convention on Human Rights because the State failed …Read more

Five youths, three of whom were minors, were “street children” abducted, tortured, and killed by State security agents.  The children lived in a sector of the city where violence and crime rate were high and where State officials commit illegal acts against “street children,” including “threats, arrests, cruel, inhuman and degrading treatment and homicides as …Read more

This case was a constitutional writ for the protection of human rights (amparo), which the petitioner sought because the Government had issued a series of agreements (Governmental Agreements 118-93 and 120 – 93) through which the Ministry of Public Health and Social Assistance was stripped of a part of its budget, in order to pay …Read more