Unsurprisingly, the announcement shocked many. This Wednesday, Spanish justice agreed to let former Brazilian footballer Daniel Alves out of prison on bail of one million euros after he appealed his conviction for rape. A sum which, according to the Spanish press, could be paid by Neymar’s father.
Lula, the Brazilian president, criticized this decision during a dinner celebrating the 44th anniversary of the Workers’ Party (PT) on Wednesday evening in Brasilia. “The money that Daniel Alves has, the money that someone could lend him, cannot redeem the offense of a man towards a woman he raped,” thundered the politician.
Daniel Alves, ex-Barça legend who played for PSG (2017-2019), was sentenced at the end of February to 4 and a half years in prison for “sexual assault with penetration”, an accusation specific to Spanish justice, on a young woman on the night of December 30 to 31, 2022 in a nightclub in Barcelona.
The 40-year-old athlete, who had changed his version multiple times, finally admitted the facts but assured that the report was consensual. The Court considered that it was “established that the victim did not consent and that there are elements, in addition to the testimony of the complainant, to prove the rape. »
This Wednesday, shortly after the provisional release of Dani Alves was made official, the plaintiff’s lawyer also denounced this decision, comparing it to “a scandal”, and described Spanish justice as “justice for the rich “.
This is not the first time that the president of Brazil has publicly attacked a Brazilian football star. In October 2022, he did not hesitate to denounce Neymar’s support for Jair Bolsonaro, the former far-right president.
More recently, last week, he took a position in favor of the incarceration of Robinho, judging that he had to “pay the price of his irresponsibility” for an “unforgivable” crime. On Wednesday, Brazil’s Superior Court of Justice (STJ) ruled that the former AC Milan player will have to serve a nine-year prison sentence in his native country for gang rape committed in absentia in Italy, for acts dating back to 2013.
