The case against Heckler & Koch was especially notable because of a police operation in the town of Iguala on the night of 27 September 2014 when security forces attacked college students from Ayotzinapa. During the police operation, seven students were killed and 43 were forcefully “disappeared” and reportedly handed over to a criminal syndicate. There is still no trace of the students. Many other students were left injured, among them Aldo Gutiérrez Solano who has been in a coma ever since. Mexican investigators found that at least seven policemen fired G36 rifles that originated from the unauthorized shipment.
In September 2016, ECCHR requested access to the case files of the Stuttgart proceedings on behalf of Gutiérrez Solano, whose interests are represented by his parents. This marked a first step towards justice for those affected by the export of these German arms. ECCHR’s intervention was intended to highlight that legal proceedings against arms exporters need to take more than just German trade law into consideration. However, the request was denied. As a result, the concrete consequences for those affected by the arms shipment in the recipient countries were ignored.