Justice confirms four years in prison for soccer player Santi Mina for a crime of sexual abuse

The appeal section of the Civil and Criminal Chamber of the TSJA has confirmed the sentence of the Court of Almería for which it sentenced the soccer player Santi Mina to four years in prison for a crime of sexual abuse. However, it does partially uphold the appeal promoted by the defendant's defense and lowers the compensation from 50,000 euros to 25,000 euros for the moral damage caused to the victim.

The sentence, against which an appeal can be made before the Supreme Court, accepts the proven facts of the resolution of the Audiencia de Almería, which recounted the sexual abuse that occurred in June 2017 in a van that was parked in the vicinity of a nightclub from Mójácar (Almería), where Mina and another defendant with two more friends stayed and traveled, as reported by the TSJA.

The ruling, which confirms DG's acquittal, stresses that “there is no express mention that the victim consented to any of the abusive acts described” despite the fact that the appellant insists that “there was a consensual sexual interaction” that was denied at all times by the victim.

Along these lines, although he suppresses the concept of “superiority” introduced in the account of the facts when referring to how the space inside the van in which the abuses took place was used, he points out that “there was no flawed consent of the victim”, since neither in the account of the facts nor in the legal grounds of the judgment of the Court there is evidence of consent.

The Court rejects the convicted person's grounds for appeal, in which he indicates that his right to effective judicial protection was violated because the ruling of the Almería Court was not impartial when assessing the victim's statements. In addition, although it defends that there were contradictions in the different statements of the victim, the Chamber explains that the victim's account lacks “relevant contradictions in essential aspects.”

It also rules out the appeal section that the victim acted motivated by a spurious motive, which would consist of obtaining a large compensation. In this sense, it indicates that the testimony of the complainant “seems reliable to us, we also appreciate that she persisted in her incrimination and although, in effect, she did add new facts in her second statement, we have ruled out that this extreme was relevant.”

The courtroom rejects the appeal of the private prosecution, to which the Public Prosecutor joined, regarding an increase in the sentence on the understanding that the four years in prison imposed are proportional to the “transience” of the typical conduct and to the “will repairing” evidenced by the defendant, especially after having ruled out an abuse of superiority or the participation of his partner.

Thus, it recalls that the victim did not want to claim any type of compensation when her rights were instructed in court, this being precisely the moment in which the complainant mentioned the second part of the sexual abuse recognized in the proven facts.

Regarding compensation for moral damages, the victim asked that it be increased from the 50,000 that the Court sentence included to almost 117,000 to compensate for the damage and its impact on his daily life, while the convicted person asked that it be reduced to 2,000 euros. Finally, the TSJA reduces the compensation to 25,000 euros.

In this sense, it explains that it must maintain the criterion of proportionality that the court maintains with cases of the same characteristics, in addition to taking into account objective factors, such as the transience of the prosecuted conduct, the manifest wish of the victim in his first judicial statement of not receiving compensation and the extent of the consequences reflected in the expert report of the forensic psychologist.

The Court of Almería considered that the sexual abuse in June 2017 in Mojácar was proven after the victim provided in the oral hearing “a resounding testimony, abundant in detail and coincident in substance and essential with what he had previously stated at the headquarters police and in the headquarters of instruction.

The resolution also remarked that the prosecution testimony was “corroborated by different and definitive evidence,” including the forensic medical report that detailed extra-genital and genital lesions consisting of ecchymosis and the psychological expert revealed that he presents anxious symptoms and severe depressive disorder related to the events, “his daily life having been greatly affected, suffering from chronic post-traumatic stress disorder directly related to the events”.

Likewise, she alluded to “the testimony of the witnesses who made it clear that “she arrived clearly scared, crying, screaming and with a great state of anxiety” and specified that this event could be witnessed “both by both witnesses and by the doctor who assisted her at the health center immediately after the attack”.

The court chaired by Judge Társila Martínez stressed that, given the “coherence” of the victim's story, Santi Mina in his first statement “categorically denied having even touched her.”

“Only by finding his DNA in the vaginal cavity, he is forced to modify his version of the facts and acknowledge that there was vaginal penetration,” the ruling moved to substantiate that the footballer's version has “little credibility” since “it is changeable depending on the evolution of the investigative proceedings”.