Gacaca Court - Classification of Crimes Into Four Categories

Classification of Crimes Into Four Categories

The categories were originally created in 1996 by the Act on the Organisation and Pursuits of Crimes against Humanity. The Organic Law 08/96 of August 30, 1996 established the categorization of genocide defendants:

1st category

• Planners, organisers, instigators, supervisors of the genocide
• Leaders at the national, provincial or district level, within political parties, army, religious denominations or militia;
• The well-known murderer who distinguished himself because of the zeal which characterised him in the killings or the excessive wickedness with which killings were carried out.
• People who committed rape or acts of sexual torture.

2nd category

• Authors, co-authors, accomplices of deliberate homicides, or of serious attacks that caused someone’s death.
• The person who—with intention of killing—caused injuries or committed other serious violence, but without actually

causing death.

3rd category

• The person who committed criminal acts or became accomplice of serious attacks, without the intention of causing death.

4th category

• The person having committed offences against property.

Sentences provided according to the crime category and confession/guilty recognition

1st category

• Has not confessed or his/her confession has been rejected—Death sentence or life imprisonment;
• Confession before the publication of his/her name on the list of first category—25 years imprisonment;

2nd category

• Has not confessed or his/her confession has been rejected—25 years imprisonment or life imprisonment;
• Confession after accusation and name put on the list made by the Cell's Gacaca Courts—12 to 15 years imprisonment, half of it is spent in prison, the other is commuted to works of public interest;
• Confession before accusation and name put on the list made by the Cell's Gacaca Court—7 to 12 years imprisonment, half of it is spent in prison, the other is commuted to works of public interest;

3rd category

• Has not confessed or his/her confession has been rejected—5 to 7 years imprisonment, half of it is spent in prison, the other is commuted to works of public interest;
• Confession before name being put on the list made by the Cell's Gacaca Court—1 to 3 years imprisonment, half of the sentence is served in prison and the rest is commuted to works of public interest;

4th category

• Return the stolen things or pay the equivalent.

Gacaca has been implemented in a pilot phase (lasted 18 months) with the Organic Law 40/2000 of 26.01.2001. Organic Law 16/2004 of 19.06.2004 reorganizes Gacaca process. The categories have been reduced to 3: the former categories 2 and 3 were combined to make category 2 and the 4th category became the 3d one.

The first category of alleged criminals (those accused of planning or leading the Genocide and those accused of torture, rape or other sexual crimes) will be (and in some cases already are) prosecuted before State (national) criminal courts. The gacaca do not have jurisdiction over crimes of the first category. The Gacaca courts will adjudicate the two other remaining categories ("simple" murder, bodily injury, property damage), which has started early 2006. Capital punishment was abolished in Rwanda in the summer of 2007.

How defendants were categorized by Gacaca Courts (pilot phase)

• Number of persons categorized: 59,171

1. Category 1—6,817 (11.5%)
2. Category 2—36,426 (61.6%)
3. Category 3—15,928 (26.9%)