It identifies the right of every citizen detained and waiting to appear immediately and publicly before a court or an authority. Judges, upon hearing the testimony of the detainee, determine whether the detention is legal or illegal and, therefore, can order its end.
It constitutes an institution of legal order that seeks to avoid arbitrary arrests and that guarantees the personal freedom of the individual. The remedy is often used to prevent abuse by the authorities because it requires that the detainee's situation be revealed to a judge.
The habeas corpus process is intended to defend and contain two extremely important rights, such as individual liberty and integrity, that is, that a person cannot be unjustly arrested, without reasons and cannot be subjected to aggression or torture while in detention..
It is vitally important to mention that there are local and international organizations that deal with these rights and of course defend the institution of habeas corpus.
Experts say that habeas corpus dates back to Roman times, when its goal was to showcase the free man who was detained by someone else. When it was used as a legal instrument to prevent violations of the freedom of citizens who were suddenly deprived of their liberty by any person and not by a competent authority.
Meanwhile, formally, the institution of habeas corpus began to be applied in the first years of the fourteenth century, in England, when Edward I ruled and was required to report on the arrest of a subject.
