Film Screening: Justice and the Generals

In April, 2015, retired Salvadoran General Eugenio Vides Casanova was deported from his Florida home of some 25 years to El Salvador, where he was once Minister of Defense. Justice and the Generals tells the story. Aired on PBS in 2002, the film follows the 20-year saga to hold two Salvadoran generals accountable for the rape and murder of four American churchwomen, culminating in a Florida federal trial with historic implications for the prosecution of human rights abusers. The legal argument turned on when military commanders have a legal responsibility to take action to prevent human rights abuse.

When the Florida jury decided to let Generals Garcia and Vides Casanova off the hook on a technicality, another case (Romagoza vs. Garcia, et al) quickly followed. Several Salvadoran survivors of torture—also interviewed in the film—brought charges for torture against the generals, and this time the jury decided they were accountable for human rights crimes comitted under their command. It took another 13 years to finally deport General Vides Casanova. Will Garcia be next? 

A discussion with several key players in the legal saga—Carolyn Patty Blum, Scott Greathead, and Ken Hurwitz—will follow the screening. 

Speakers

• Carolyn Patty Blum currently serves as the senior legal adviser to the Center for Justice and Accountability, a San Francisco–based NGO that seeks to bring human rights abusers to justice.
• Scott Greathead is a member of the boards of directors of the Human Rights First (formerly the Lawyers Committee for Human Rights), which he helped to found in 1978, and of Human Rights in China.
• Ken Hurwitz is senior legal officer for the Anticorruption Program of the Open Society Justice Initiative. He was previously a senior associate at Human Rights First, where he worked to help ensure legal accountability for serious human rights violations in international and national fora.