The National Court has given permission for former president of the Royal Spanish Football Federation Luis Rubiales and former coach of the women’s national team Jorge Wilda to be tried over the incident with Jennifer Hermoso after the final of the Women’s World Cup. Rubiales then kissed Hermoso without her consent.
The third panel of the Criminal Court accepted this decision, rejecting the appeals against the order of the judge in the case Francisco de Jorge, with which he proposed to try them, filed by Rubiales and Vilda and by the other two investigated: the former sports director of the national team Albert Luque and former head of marketing Ruben Rivera.
In four orders, one for each applicant, the panel explained that in the procedural phase of the case the purpose is not to establish the facts, but rather a procedural impulse in which the investigating authority must assess whether there is evidence to continue production.
In the present case, the Court considers that the facts described in the appealed decree include features that correspond to the typical description of a crime against sexual freedom and another crime related to coercion, regardless of whether they fall within the scope of 172.1 of the Criminal Code or are of -light nature.
The court stated that the legal implications “of the kiss and consent cannot be assessed at this stage” and warned the appellants that they could not attempt to compare the statements at this stage of the proceedings as if it were an oral trial.
The witnesses, the decree added, recounted facts that could be included in the composition of the two crimes, so the evidentiary challenge would correspond to the plenary phase and not to the investigation, “which is limited to ascertaining whether there are signs and whether they can be misled under a certain type of crime. Both requirements are fulfilled in the contested definition”.
In the indictment, the prosecution asked for a sentence of two and a half years of imprisonment for Rubiales for the following crimes: sexual assault and coercion, and one and a half years of imprisonment for coercion for the other three defendants.
