Foro Penal


Foro Penal is a Venezuelan human rights organization that provides legal assistance pro bono to people subject of arbitrary detentions and their relatives The organization is composed by regional coordinators for each state in Venezuela, pro bono lawyers on a national level and a network of over five thousand volunteers, non-lawyer activists, known as "active defensors".

History

Lawyers and founded the non-governmental organization Víctimas Venezolanas de Violaciones a los Derechos Humanos as a response to human rights violations that occurred after the Llaguno Overpass events in Caracas on 11 April. The same year lawyers Carlos Bastidas Espinoza and, among others, founded the NGO Foro Penal Venezolano to investigate abuses of the judicial branch and to promote an amnesty law for all political prisoners of the 11 April events.

Structure

Foro Penal is constituted as a civil association composed by regional coordinators for each state in Venezuela, pro bono lawyers on a national level and a network of over five thousand volunteers, non-lawyer activists, known as "active defensors". The directive board is made up of Alfredo Romero, director president, Gonzalo Himiob, director vicepresident, and Robiro Teran.

Attacks

In 2008, Mónica Fernández suffered an attack in which she was shot in the back. Despite being shot very close to her spine she did not suffer major injuries.
Alfredo Romero has been criminalized several times by state officials and in media programs, particularly in Diosdado Cabello's Con El Mazo Dando, has received death threats, has been harassed in national airports and has denounced the intervention of Foro Penal's communications without a warrant. Romero has a cautelary protection measure issued by the Inter-American Commission of Human Rights sin 17 March 2015.
During a 2017 interview by Spanish journalist in the program Salvados, Nicolás Maduro accused Foro Penal of being financed by the United States, as well as other organizations such as Transparency International and Caritas, and of being "directed by delinquents".

Awards

Foro Penal has been awarded several times both in Venezuela and abrod, including the award given by the United States government in July 2015, the condecoration to Foro Penal in Zulia state by the State Lawyers Association in August 2015 and the award given by the Barcelona Lawyers Association, Spain, in February 2016. The organization's director, Alfredo Romero, was awarded with the Robert F. Kennedy Human Rights Award in 2017. The organization has been nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize in 2015 and 2016.