He was considered a former Brazilian football star Ronaldinho,That his imprisonment and then placed him under house arrest in Paraguay for using a false passport was a "very severe blow" to him.
"It is a very cruel blow, I have never imagined that I would find myself in such a situation," the former striker said in an interview with Paraguayan newspaper "ABC".
In his first public statement since his arrest in early March with his brother Roberto de Assis Moreira, hours after their arrival in Asuncion, Ronaldinho added, "I found myself completely trapped when I was unaware, when I learned that my passports were not valid."
Ronaldinho and his brother became accused of entering Paraguay in possession of false passports.
After about a month spent behind bars, the golden ball bearer moved in 2005 and his brother, on April 7, to the recently rehabilitated Hotel Palagura in 2019, located in a building built in the early twentieth century in the Paraguayan capital, Asuncion, after paying a financial guarantee of approximately 1.6 million US dollars.
The Brazilian star hoped to regain his freedom "as soon as possible" after cooperating fully with Paraguay's police investigations. "We have come to participate in the launch of an online casino, and to publish my autobiography with the company responsible for marketing rights in Paraguay," he said.
He pointed out that he was originally scheduled to return to his country on the seventh of March, on the occasion of his son's birthday.
"The first thing I will do as soon as I leave Paraguay is to go and kiss my mother and then remedy the situation," said Ronaldinho, who celebrated his 40th birthday on March 21 in prison.
Ronaldinho and his brother face up to five years in prison.
Ronaldinho is considered one of the most prominent players in the history of football, and he has won almost all the titles available to him from the World Cup, Copa America, the Confederations Cup, the Champions League, the Spanish and Italian League, and the Golden Ball. He also represented three of the largest European clubs, including Barcelona, Italian AC Milan and Paris Saint-Germain.
A Brazilian court had denied Ronaldinho his passport at the end of 2018, for not paying a $ 2.5 million fine against the backdrop of building a dock without permission, on the edge of a lake in a protected area in Porto Alegre (south), according to local media.