The trial of Luis Rubiales, former president of RFEF (Royal Spanish Football Federation), for the kiss given at player Jenni Hermoso after the 2023 women’s World Cup final ended on Friday (14), with an expected verdict in coming weeks.
“With this, believe it or not, we ended up,” said Judge José Manuel Fernández-Prieto, after the former leader did not speak at the last hearing of the trial, which has been held around Madrid since February 3.
Rubiales also made no statements to the press when leaving the court.
The trial aims to determine whether the 47-year-old former president of RFEF is guilty of sexual assault on the kiss, and coercion, for pressuring the player to take focus from the case in view of the followed global scandal.
In the conclusions of the lawsuit, Rubiales’s lawyer asked her acquittal because, according to her, there is evidence that “confirms that Jennifer Hermoso gave her consent” to the kiss, while the prosecutor kept her two -and -a -half year -to -arrest request, pointing out that There is no “no doubt” that it was “a non -consensual kiss.”
Reacting to the end of the trial, the Spanish minister of equality, Eva Redondo, said that Spain has “a good law” against sexual aggression, which “directly challenges chauvinism and puts consent in the center”, and expressed his confidence of May the sentence be “according to Spanish legislation”.
“Countless” pressures
In his statement, the number 10 of the women’s team insisted that it did not consent to the kiss, which was “totally out of context”.
Mexico’s current midfielder of Tigers also reported the “countless” times they asked him to speak to justify the acts.
The version is contested by Rubiales, who, in his testimony on Tuesday, said he was “totally safe” that Hermoso consented to answer him “Vale” when he asked if he could “kiss him”.
Also processed by the alleged coercion of Hermoso were coached Jorge Vilda, former commander of the Spanish female team, and two former RFEF employees, Rubén Rivera and Albert Luque.
The prosecution asks for a year and a half of arrest for each one.
Prosecutor Marta Durántez Gil estimated that “there is total coherence between the facts narrated” by Hermoso and “her immediate and later behavior” and criticized one of Rubiales’s lines of defense: that the player participated with joy in the World Cup celebrations.
The trial also featured the testimony of Hermoso’s companions in the national team, such as the twice winner of the Golden Ball Alexia Putellas, who confirmed the pressures against the player.
