Definitive Report - Report No 370, October 2013

Case No 2975 (Costa Rica) - Complaint date: 20-JUL-11 - Closed

Allegations: Arrest and criminal prosecution of a traffic police officer and trade union official

1. 355. The complaint is contained in a communication from the National Union of Professional Traffic Technicians (UNATEPROT) dated 20 July 2011.
2. 356. The Government sent its observations in a communication dated 12 June 2013.
3. 357. Costa Rica has ratified the Freedom of Association and Protection of the Right to Organise Convention, 1948 (No. 87), and the Right to Organise and Collective Bargaining Convention, 1949 (No. 98).

A. The complainant’s allegations

1. 358. In its communication dated 20 July 2011, the UNATEPROT alleges that, in the context of negotiation of a collective agreement for traffic police, on 25 May 2011 two officials of the Traffic Unit of the Judicial Investigation Department illegally detained Mr Joselito Ureña Vargas, General Secretary of UNATEPROT, in his office, without showing an arrest warrant or informing him of the charges against him, following a complaint filed against him for allegedly threatening a young person. The complainant states that the union official had already gone to the Public Prosecutor’s Office to give an account of the facts, and that the judicial authority had issued a restraining order to stay away from the Canton of Desamparados. He was detained in the presence of press and television reporters, who reported on the following day that the union official had been detained for threatening a witness and tampering with the scene of an accident in which a 19-year-old man died.

B. The Government’s reply

1. 359. In its communication dated 12 June 2013, the Government cites the report from the Office of the Prosecutor General of the Attorney-General’s Office on the events referred to in the complaint, from which it appears that: (1) the charges against the traffic officer and trade union official Mr Joselito Ureña Vargas stem from a complaint filed by individuals accusing him of the offences of tampering with evidence, abuse of authority and dereliction of duty in responding to a traffic accident in his capacity as a public servant (following manslaughter committed by another person); (2) Mr Joselito Ureña Vargas’s trade union office has no bearing whatsoever on the criminal investigation under way; (3) the fact that Mr Joselito Ureña Vargas threatened several witnesses (including minors), and even drove his car up to one of them in order to intimidate him, was corroborated; (4) Mr Joselito Ureña Vargas’s detention on the order of the Attorney-General’s Office was based on the urgent need to bring him before the competent judge in order to safeguard the outcome of the investigation. This necessary intervention was not in violation of the union’s property; and (5) the judicial authority rejected the prosecutor’s request for preventive custody, but ordered precautionary measures (barring him from the Canton of Desamparados, following evidence that the accused had committed the offence under investigation and that there was a risk of obstruction of justice).

C. The Committee’s conclusions

1. 360. The Committee notes that, in this complaint, the complainant alleges the illegal detention, without showing an arrest warrant, of a union official and traffic police officer, in his office at the trade union headquarters, as well as criminal prosecution against him, in the context of an ongoing collective bargaining process.
2. 361. The Committee notes that the Government denies the anti-union nature of the union official’s arrest and states that it took place following a complaint filed by individuals and at the request of the Attorney-General’s Office, and the arrest was not upheld by the judicial authority, which, however, instituted criminal proceedings and ordered provisional measures against him. The Committee observes that the report from the Attorney-General’s Office forwarded by the Government (and provided by the complainant) clearly indicates that the allegations refer to possible criminal misconduct by a traffic officer in his capacity as a public servant (tampering with a crime scene, threats, etc., following manslaughter committed by another person, who was driving a motorcycle).
3. 362. In these circumstances, the Committee concludes that this case does not raise the issues of freedom of association and considers that it does not call for further examination.

The Committee’s recommendation

1. 363. In the light of its foregoing conclusions, the Committee invites the Governing Body to decide that this case does not call for further examination.