Catalonia’s highest court sentenced former Brazil football player Dani Alves to four and a half years in jail on Thursday after finding him guilty of s*xually abusing a woman in a Barcelona nightclub in 2022. Alves was also mandated by the court to provide the victim with 150,000 euros ($162,990).
„Dani Alves was found guilty on Thursday morning. He has also been sentenced to a further five years of ‘supervised’ freedom upon release and requested to pay €150,000 to the victim plus legal fees.“https://t.co/xWBKzbwfXp
— Mara Pfeiffer 🐱 (@[email protected]) (@Wortpiratin) February 22, 2024
“The sentence considers that it has been proven that the victim did not consent, and that there is evidence, in addition to the testimony of the plaintiff, to consider the rape proven,” the court said in a statement.
Alves’ lawyers informed reporters outside the courthouse that he plans to appeal the term, which also includes a nine-and-a-half-year restraining order and a five-year probationary period upon release, on the grounds that the s*x was consensual.
But after serving 25% of his sentence and fulfilling other conditions, Alves will be allowed to apply for short-term leave from the prison outside of Barcelona, according to a court official.
The victim’s testimony was taken into consideration by the court, along with the fact that Alves’ actions after pushing her to the ground caused her to injure her knee and that she experienced aftereffects.
David Saenz, a representative from the victim’s legal team, told reporters, “We are satisfied as the sentence recognizes what we’ve been saying all along that the victim was telling the truth and that she suffered.” He also said the team would evaluate whether the sentence was appropriate given the seriousness of the crime.
Alves’ lawyer, Inés Guardiola, disagreed with the sentencing, saying: “We are going to appeal. I still believe in Dani Alves’ innocence. We haven’t read the whole sentence yet because it’s very long, but we are going to study it in detail now. We defend [Alves’] innocence.”
Fabrizio Romano shared a post on Twitter:
🚨 Dani Alves has been sentenced to 4 years and 6 months in prison for sexual assault.
It also includes 5 years of supervised release and incommunication with the victim for 9 years and 6 months.
He will also pay legal costs.
🇧🇷 “We will appeal”, Dani Alves’ lawyer said. pic.twitter.com/Vq0QuIyTb4
— Fabrizio Romano (@FabrizioRomano) February 22, 2024
The victim had demanded 12 years in jail, while the prosecutor had wanted nine. However, the court decided to sentence Alves to four and a half years, citing his decision to compensate the victim regardless of the trial’s outcome as a mitigating factor. Ester García, the victim’s attorney, questioned the fairness of allowing wealthy criminals to pay for a reduced sentence.
“I reserve the right to take legal action, and it is my understanding that from a legal point of view, there should be an appeal,” García said.
Garcia stated that her client was nevertheless satisfied that Alves had been found guilty. The victim added, “In the end, they believed me,” as reported by García. Alves, 40, was charged with s*xual assault of a woman in the restroom of a posh Barcelona nightclub early on December 31, 2022, and he was taken into custody in January 2023.
Since then, Alves has been held in preventative pretrial detention in Spain because a court has consistently denied his petitions for bail, believing that he poses a flight risk.
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Earlier this month, the case was tried in a Barcelona courtroom over three days, and just before the trial started, Alves altered his testimony for the fifth time.
He first insisted that he did not know the alleged woman. Subsequently, he claimed that nothing transpired despite meeting the woman in the club’s restroom.
When presented with biological evidence, the former Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain defender altered his account of events once more, claiming she had engaged in oral s*x with him in a consensual manner.
Alves initially acknowledged having s*x with the lady in April after receiving negative findings from additional biological testing. He claimed the encounter was consensual and that he had lied to his wife to conceal his adultery.
Alves admitted to being intoxicated that evening for the first time before the hearing. “I am not that type of man,” Alves declared in answer to his defense attorney’s questioning of him during the trial about whether or not he had coerced the woman into having s*x.
State prosecutors were informed by the lady that she had danced with Alves and had voluntarily gone into the bathroom but that he had later refused to let her leave. He allegedly raped her, slapped her, and humiliated her.
Alves denied that,
“We were both enjoying ourselves,” Alves stated, restating again and time again that the woman never begged to go or indicated that she was uncomfortable having s*x with him. In addition, he denied ever hitting or insulting her.
A friend and relative of the woman said during the three-day trial that she was “distraught” after leaving the bathroom, and police officers who attended to her that evening testified that she was severely shaken and informed them that Alves had s*xually attacked her.
Alves’s companion claimed that the football player had consumed wine and whiskey prior to entering the nightclub; intoxication may be taken into account by a judge as an excuse, resulting in a reduced prison term.
According to the friend, Alves and the woman had “chemistry” and danced together before using the restroom, and he hadn’t observed anything strange about her subsequently.
The woman was examined by a forensic psychologist, who testified that she had post-traumatic symptoms. However, an outside expert summoned by the defense disagreed with this assessment.
According to Yolanda Díaz, the deputy prime minister of Spain, she hopes the sentence “serves as an exemplary measure for all the s*xist behaviors that women suffer in all areas of our lives.”
After a wave of protests following a gang rape case during the San Fermin bull-running festival in Pamplona in 2016, Spain revised its rules in 2022, making consent a crucial factor in defining a s*x crime. The Alves case was the first high-profile s*x crime since that time.
The rule, sometimes referred to as the “only yes means yes” statute, clarifies that silence or inactivity do not equate to permission, defining consent as an expressive declaration of a person’s choice.
However, before it was changed, the law established lower minimum penalties, like the one given to Alves, which resulted in decreased terms for hundreds of s*x offenders. The decision was applauded by Irene Montero, the former minister of equality who supported the “only yes means yes” rule.
“The sentence against Dani Alves clearly establishes that he committed s*xual assault because the victim did not consent. It is the result of the feminist fight for the right to s*xual freedom and for putting consent at the center,” the writer stated on X.
Alves played for more than 20 years and won numerous championships with prestigious teams like Barça, Juventus, and PSG. At the age of 38, he also assisted Brazil in winning two Copa América titles and an Olympic gold medal.
In 2022, he participated in his third World Cup—the only major championship he has yet to win. He was a player for Barça from 2008 to 2016, and he briefly returned to the team in 2022 before joining Pumas in Mexico. As soon as Alves was arrested, the Mexican club terminated his contract.
