The Myrna Mack Case: An Update (1998)

Summary: This 2003 report focuses on a CHR mission to Guatemala in fall 2002. The delegates sent by the committee were National Academies’ members Mary Jane West-Eberhard and Morton Panish. The focus of their trip was to observe the second phase of the trial of three former military officers charged with ordering the 1990 murder of Guatemalan anthropologist Myrna Mack—one of whom was convicted and sentenced to 30 years’ imprisonment for the crime. The report includes an accounting of the 18 hours of trial hearings that the delegates observed and background about the political context in Guatemala at the time of the trial. In addition, the delegates also attended two public tributes in memory of Myrna Mack and met with Guatemalan human rights NGO representatives, as well as the U.S. Embassy’s human rights officer and the Guatemalan advisor to the United Nations Development Program. In an effort to show their solidarity with Guatemalan scientific colleagues, some of whom had been receiving death threats before and during the trial, the delegates met with several scientists to learn how the international scientific community might best assist their Guatemalan colleagues to carry out their scientific work in a safer environment.