Expert commissions are often convened by Colombian governments to diagnose and submit proposals concerning the problems of violence and crime.This article analyzes the work of some of those groups or commissions and the impact of their recommendations in the design of criminal policy or more specifically of legislation produced in the second half of the twentieth century.The text contains some reflections on the conditions of integration of such commissions, and the effects they produce in the recognition of "experts".It is important to anticipate that war is a common element of context in these expert groups, on their recommendations and on criminal laws analyzed in this article.This explains the references to the relations between war and criminal law in the paper.