(Barcelona) Former star of Barça and PSG, Brazilian footballer Dani Alves is on trial from Monday in Barcelona for the rape of a young woman in a nightclub.
The prosecution – which requires before the trial in Spain – is demanding nine years in prison against him as well as the payment of 150,000 euros to the young woman and ten years of supervised release at the end of her incarceration.
This trial, which is scheduled to last until Wednesday, opens at 10 a.m. local time (4 a.m. Eastern time).
In pre-trial detention for more than a year, the player, who disputes the facts, is accused by this young woman of having raped her in the toilets of a VIP room at the Sutton nightclub in Barcelona, on the night of 30 December 31, 2022.
According to the indictment, Dani Alves, 40, was in this nightclub with a friend on the evening of the incident. After offering champagne to the complainant, her cousin and a friend, he allegedly invited her to accompany him to an exclusive area of the nightclub with toilets, which she did not know.
“Anguish and terror”
The player, who was on vacation in Barcelona after participating in the World Cup in Qatar with Brazil, would then have had a “violent attitude” towards the young woman, whom he would have forced to have sexual relations, again according to the prosecution.
“The victim asked him several times […] to let her go, saying that she wanted to leave, but the accused prevented her from doing so,” we can still read in the indictment, which describes a “situation of anguish and terror » for the young woman.
Medically taken care of that night, the complainant suffered from “post-traumatic stress of generally high intensity” for which she was being monitored, according to the public prosecutor.
In order to protect her in the face of the great media interest this trial arouses, her hearing will be held behind closed doors. Her identity will also never be revealed during the hearings while a screen will allow her not to be “visually confronted with the accused”, the court decided.
The latter, who must also hear around twenty witnesses, on the other hand rejected the request of the prosecution which wanted the trial to take place entirely behind closed doors.
An agreement still possible
Since the start of the case, Dani Alves has changed his version several times, going so far as to say in a video at the beginning of January that he had never met the complainant.
He then justified himself by asserting that he did not want to jeopardize his marriage before eventually admitting that he had had a sexual relationship with the young woman, but that it was consensual.
Spanish justice has repeatedly refused his release pending trial, highlighting a “high risk of flight” for the player to Brazil, a country which generally does not extradite its nationals.
In theory, an agreement remains possible until the start of the trial between the accused, the complainant and the prosecution, within the framework of which Alves could admit his guilt in exchange for a reduction in his sentence and compensation for the victim .
At the end of November, the plaintiff’s lawyer denied having reached such an agreement, but admitted the existence of “conversations” initiated at the request of the player’s lawyers which had not made it possible to reach any “any agreement “.
One of the most successful footballers in history, Dani Alves enjoyed the most glorious period of his career at Barça, between 2008 and 2016, where he won 23 trophies.
The player, who also played for Sevilla and Juventus in Turin, was playing for the Mexican club Pumas at the time of his incarceration in January 2022. This club, with which he was under contract until the end of the season last, had then immediately dismissed him.