Bolivia's Democratic Advancement
USAID/Bolivia
1993-1999

Since 1993, MSD has been the leader in a major reform initiative for the design, promulgation, and implementation of the landmark new Criminal Procedures Code (CPC) enacted into law in May 1999.   MSD was actively engaged in the revision process, assembling a team of lawyers and legal experts to review and revise the Code, training justice sector officials to interpret the new Code, training police and prosecutors to enforce the new Code.  A component of the final approval of the new Criminal Procedures Code was creation of a model tribunal in 1999. During the two-year vacatio legis—a required two-year period during which new laws lie dormant-MSD worked directly with civil society organizations to prepare public outreach messages and publications to alert and advise local groups, particularly disenfranchised citizens, of the new Code and its human rights protections.  MSD also provided technical assistance to create and install an automated case tracking system in the Santa Cruz Superior District Court. The USAID Contractor Performance Report cited MSD as an "excellently performing firm" and “the best that the Project Officer had worked with in the past ten years."