Dani Alves, one of the most successful football players of his generation, was found guilty of raping a woman in a Barcelona nightclub and sentenced to four years and six months in prison on Thursday. Besides disgracing the former Brazil and Barcelona right back, the conviction was applauded in Spain as a victory for a pioneering sexual liberty law that emphasises the lack of consent of the victim as key to determining sex crimes.
Catalonia's top court on Thursday found former Brazil footballer Dani Alves guilty of sexually assaulting a woman in a Barcelona nightclub in 2022, sentencing him to 4½ years in prison.
The court also ordered that Alves pay €150,000 ($162,990) to the victim.
"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 had maintained the sex was consensual, and his lawyers told reporters outside the courthouse that he intends to appeal the sentence, which also includes a five-year probation upon release and a 9½-year restraining order.
The prosecutor had been seeking a nine-year prison term.
"We are satisfied as the sentence recognises what we've been saying all along: that the victim was telling the truth and that she suffered," the victim's lawyer David Saenz told reporters, adding that his team would analyse whether the sentence corresponds to the gravity of the crime.
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