Cristina Rubio Barce
barce
Updated Thursday, February 22, 2024-10:13
Dani Alves, sentenced to 4 and a half years in prison for sexual assault.
The trial began just two weeks ago, on Monday, February 5, and was scheduled for sentencing on Wednesday the 7th with Alves sitting in the dock after a year in preventive detention.
At the Barcelona Court, the victim, two of her friends present that night in Sutton, the former footballer's wife, Joana Sanz, several friends of the Brazilian, agents of the Mossos d'Esquadra, doctors and health personnel at the Hospital Clínic and himself testified. Alves, who declared last.
The case dates back to the night of Friday, December 30, 2022.
Alves
was on vacation in
Barcelona
before rejoining the Pumas of Mexico and after having played in the World Cup.
After 2:30 in the morning, he went to the nightclub's booth with a friend and occupied table 6, the only one that gives exclusive access to the so-called Suite, an area with a small toilet, a living room with a sofa, a television and a refrigerator.
There, in the booth, they met the young woman and two other girls.
After inviting them to drink for an hour, the former full-back of the Brazilian team would have insisted that the young woman enter the exclusive area where the small toilet was, which she did not know about.
In that bathroom, according to the
Prosecutor's Office
,
Alves
would have shown a "violent attitude" towards the woman, whom he attacked and forced to have sexual relations, despite her resistance.
"He penetrated her vaginally until he ejaculated, without using a condom and without her consent," the Public Ministry said in its indictment.
"The victim repeatedly requested that he let her go, that she wanted to get out of there, and the defendant did not allow it," indicates the document, which states that she experienced a "situation of anguish and terror" described throughout the trial.
In her statement before the court on February 5, the complainant confirmed that
Dani Alves
raped her on the night of January 30, 2022 in a reserved bathroom at the Sutton nightclub in the Catalan capital.
A story supported by the prosecutor - "[The victim] could not have been confused, it is impossible," she stated in her final report -, by two witnesses who testified throughout the hearing, several police officers, local staff and professionals from the Hospital Clínic .
"[The victim] told me that she had hurt him a lot and that she had come inside" as soon as she left the bathroom, said both witnesses, present that night in Sutton.
The complainant's friend also recalled how she and her cousin encouraged her to file a complaint: "We told her that she had to report this. She just said 'they're going to think I'm doing this for money'. I tried to calm her down at all times. because she wanted to go home. 'They're not going to believe me,' she repeated."
"There was violence and contempt for the victim," said the prosecutor after dismantling Alves' version with her conclusions.
"Honestly, I think that all this battery of versions that he has given is because initially he considered himself totally unpunished. He came to the investigative court supremely calm," the Public Ministry stressed in the final report presented on February 7.
All after Alves denied the rape in the bathrooms of the Sutton nightclub and assured that the relations were consensual.
The Prosecutor's Office maintained the request for 9 years in prison, which the complainant's defense raised to 12, the maximum penalty.
The former footballer, for his part, demanded acquittal and his release, although he proposed as an alternative a sentence of one year in prison - the period he has been in preventive detention - and 50,000 euros in compensation.