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Jean Bosco Barayagwiza was leader of the Rwandan Hutu political party known as the Coalition pour la Défense de la République (CDR). CDR militia, under his leadership, participated in the 1994 torture and massacre of thousands of Rwanda's Tutsi minority, as well as moderate members of the Hutu majority.

Barayagwiza was also the owner and board member of radio station RTLM, which encouraged the violence against the Tutsi by broadcasting messages of hate stating that the Tutsi were "the enemy", "traitors," and "deserved to die”.

A lawsuit for damages was filed against Barayagwiza by individuals related to persons who died in the massacres. On 9 April 1996, the District Court of New York ordered the award of $500,000 per relative for pain and suffering, $1,000,000 in punitive damages per relative victim, in addition to the $5,000,000 requested for each plaintiff.

When Rwandan President Habyariamana was killed on 6 April 1994, it reignited ethnic tensions in Rwanda between the Hutu and Tutsi populations, which had earlier in the same decade culminated in a bloody civil war.

Omar Serushago was the de facto leader of the civilian Interahamwe militia, one of the primary perpetrators of the crimes committed against Tutsis and moderate Hutus in the genocide of 1994. In his official capacity, Serushago led a group of militiamen in raids against Tutsis seeking refuge in parish churches, on commercial property, in bishop’s houses, and even those who were detained in the Gendarmerie station jail. Tutsis would then be summarily executed, some personally at the hands of Serushago. Having pleaded guilty to one count of genocide and three counts of crimes against humanity (assassination, extermination and torture), Serushago was sentenced to 15 years’ imprisonment by the Trial Chamber. By a decision of 14 February 2000, the Appeals Chamber dismissed Serushago’s arguments that the sentence against him was excessively long. The present decision contains the reasons of the Appeals Chamber for having reached this conclusion. 

From 1985 to 1994, Vincent Rutaganira was conseiller communal (councilor)of Mubuga sector in Kibuye prefecture. On 6 May 1996, the Prosecutor of ICTR charged him with seven counts including genocide, conspiracy to commit genocide, murder, extermination and other inhumane acts as crimes against humanity, as well as war crimes.

On 7 December 2004, the Prosecutor and the Accused reached an agreement, pursuant to which the latter pleaded guilty to count 16 of the indictment charging him with extermination by omission as a crime against humanity for the massacres against Tutsi civilians at Mubuga church between 14 and 17 April 1994. The Trial Chamber acquitted the Accused on the other charged for lack of evidence.

The Chamber sentenced Rutaganira to 6 years of imprisonment. It took into consideration several mitigating factors including his voluntary surrender to the Tribunal in March 2002, his guilty plea, his good behaviour while in detention, his advanced age of 60 and his ill health. The Chamber further took into account the Accused’s expression of remorse, the assistance he had provided to some victims in Mubuga sector, as well as the lack of previous criminal record.  

Between 1931 and 1945, some 200,000 women were forced into sexual slaverty by the Japenese Army. These women, referred to as “comfort women” were recruited through forcible abductions, deception and coercion. Once captured, they were taken by the Japanese military to “comfort stations”, that is, facilities seized or built by the military near the front lines for express purpose of housing these women. Once there, the women would be repeatedly raped, tortured, beaten, mutilated and sometimes murdered. They were denied proper medical attention, shelter and nutrition.

The present lawsuit was brought by fifteen former “comfort women” against Japan. Having been unsuccessful before the United States District Court for the District of Columbia and the Court of Appeals for the District of Columbia Circuit, the Supreme Court vacated the decision of the Court of Appeals and remanded the case. By its decision of 28 June 2005, the Court of Appeals once again dismissed the appeal on the grounds that the Appellant’s claims were non-justiciable under the political question doctrine as they would require the Courts to interpret treaties concluded between foreign States. 

The decision is the first of its kind in France to hold accountable the French State and the national railway company, the SNCF, for complicity in the deportation of Jewish individuals during World War II. The case was brought by the Lipietz family who sought damages for the prejudice they suffered as a result of being deported from the city of Pau in southern France to the internment camp at Drancy, near Paris in 1944. They argued that the State and the SNCF were responsible because their deportation was conducted with the assistance of the SNCF and with the approval of the Home Secretary.

The Administrative Tribunal of Toulouse held that both the French state and the SNCF were complicit in the deportation of the claimants, having committed egregious errors and were accordingly fined a total of 62,000 Euros.