The newly appointed justices of the Supreme Court of Justice have inherited a major backlog of work from their predecessors, the new president of the Supreme Court of Justice and the Judicial Branch Council (CPJ), Mariano German Mejia told justices and the nation on first first day on the job.

German said that 9,533 cases were pending in the first chamber alone. He said that in 2011, the first chamber only issued sentences in 478 cases, leaving 9,533 cases pending. German Mejia replaced Jorge Subero Isa as the head of the Supreme Court.

He said that the second chamber, in charge of criminal cases, issued sentences on 2,299 cases, leaving 37 pending. The chamber received 2,151 in 2011, in addition to the cases received the previous year. He observed that penal cases were swifter because of the procedures established in the Penal Procedures Code.

In the Third Chamber that deals with land, labor and administrative and tax dispute cases, in 2011 they issued sentences on 554 cases, and left 1,212 pending.

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