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February 22, 2024
This Thursday, the Barcelona Court sentenced former Brazilian soccer player Dani Alves to four and a half years in prison for sexually assaulting a woman in a Barcelona nightclub.
Alves denied the charges and may appeal the sentence. His lawyer asked for acquittal.
The former soccer player has been in preventive detention for more than a year. In addition to the time in jail, he is sentenced to five years of supervised release and nine years of removal from the victim, to whom he must compensate 150,000 euros (US$163,000).
The Prosecutor’s Office requested nine years in prison and the private accuser 12.
In Spain, according to the Penal Code, sexual assault is considered “acts of sexual content that are carried out using violence, intimidation or abuse of a situation of superiority or vulnerability of the victim, as well as those that are carried out on people who are are deprived of sense or whose mental situation is abused and those that are carried out when the victim has had his will annulled for any reason.”
The events for which he is convicted occurred on December 31, 2022.
Prosecutors said Alves and a friend had bought champagne for three young women before taking one of them to the VIP area of the Sutton nightclub, where there was a bathroom the victim was unaware of.
It is at this point that, according to the accusing party, the situation became violent, forcing the woman to have sex despite repeatedly asking to leave.
The woman said the act caused her “distress and terror.” One of her friends who was with her described how the 23-year-old victim had cried “heartbroken” after leaving the toilet.
According to the Court, Alves “suddenly grabbed” the woman, threw her to the ground and, preventing her from moving, continued despite “the complainant saying no, she wanted to leave.”
The former soccer player argued that the woman could have left “if she had wanted to.”
In a statement, the Court said that there was evidence beyond the plaintiff’s testimony that proved that she had been raped.
Alves, 40, is one of the most decorated footballers in history. His record includes dozens of national and international titles such as 2 Copa Américas and his Olympics with Brazil and 3 Champions Leagues and 6 Spanish Leagues with Barcelona.
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Caption,
Dani Alves in 2014.
Alves has been in preventive detention since January 2023 and has changed his testimony on several occasions.
At first he denied knowing his accuser, later stating that he had met her in the bathroom but that nothing had happened between them.
He then changed his version of events again, saying that they had had consensual sexual relations. “We were both enjoying it,” she alleged.
The Prosecutor’s Office had requested nine years in prison.
In Spain, a rape report is investigated under the general charge of sexual assault and convictions can carry prison sentences of four to 15 years.
The law was recently amended to highlight the importance of consent under the so-called “Only Yes is Yes” principle.
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