Barcelona court allows convicted footballer Dani Alves out on €1 million bail
By Al Goodman and Pau Mosquera, CNN
(CNN) — A Barcelona court has ruled that former Brazilian international soccer player Dani Alves could be conditionally released from prison on a bail of $1.08 million (one million euros) following his conviction last month for sexual assault, the court press office said in a statement Wednesday.
The Barcelona provincial court sentenced Alves on February 22 to four-and-a-half years in prison for sexually assaulting a woman in one of the city’s nightclubs in late December 2022.
In the court’s 13-page ruling on the bail, viewed by CNN, the court said Alves has already served 14 months in prison, including in pre-trial detention since his arrest in Barcelona in January 2023, and more recently, since his conviction.
Alves’ lawyer has announced an appeal of the conviction and the sentence. In the bail ruling, the court said that if Alves actually pays the $1.08 million bail, he then would have to surrender his Spanish and Brazilian passports and report weekly to the court.
The court also ruled that the former Barcelona player could not get closer than a kilometer (roughly 0.6 miles) to the victim, nor have any communication with her of any kind.
Two judges approved the bail ruling, while a third judge dissented, and the decision can be appealed, the court said.
CNN has reached out to lawyers for Alves and the victim but did not immediately get a response from either.
The 40-year-old Alves is one of the most decorated soccer players of his generation, winning domestic titles in Spain, Italy and France. He won three Champions League titles with Barcelona in 2009, 2011 and 2015 and the Copa América with Brazil in 2007 and 2019.
In the 61-page sentence from Alves’ trial, which was seen by CNN, the three-judge panel wrote that they “considered proven that the accused abruptly grabbed the plaintiff, threw her to the floor and prevented her from moving” to carry out the sexual assault in December 2022.
That was “in spite of the plantiff saying no, that she wanted to leave,” the judges added. Alves insisted during the trial that the sexual relations were consensual.
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