Former Brazil international Dani Alves, who is serving a four-and-a-half-year sentence in Spain for rape in a Barcelona nightclub, asked on Tuesday to be released on bail while his appeal is considered. During a closed-door hearing at a Barcelona court, his lawyer Inés Guardiola argued that the player had served a quarter of his sentence, having been in preventive detention since January 2023.

The defence team proposed a bail of 50,000 euros and the surrender of his passports (Brazilian and Spanish) as a guarantee that he would remain in Spain during the trial and not return to Brazil or any other country without extradition while his appeal was being decided. The court accepted this, but instead demanded a bail of one million euros and imposed other penalties.

Alves, who attended the hearing via videoconference from prison, assured that he would not flee and said he trusted the justice system. The athlete's defence team had requested that he be released from custody while the High Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) considers appeals against his conviction for rape in the bathroom of Barcelona's Sutton nightclub on the night of 30 January 2022.

The prosecution rejected his request, arguing that he posed a high risk of absconding. Indeed, the risk of absconding is the 40-year-old former footballer's main argument for remaining in custody while his appeal is resolved, as the Spanish system considers the "presumption of innocence" to be definitively overturned only when a firm conviction is handed down, which has not yet happened.

One of the world's most decorated footballers, who played for Barcelona and Paris Saint-Germain among others, was sentenced on 22 February after being found guilty of raping a woman in a Barcelona nightclub in December 2022. His lawyers quickly appealed the sentence, which is why it has not yet become final.

After hearing the defence's arguments, the Barcelona Court of Appeal agreed to release the former Barça player on bail of one million euros pending the final verdict, which sentenced him to four and a half years in prison for rape.

The decision, which was not unanimous as one judge voted to keep the footballer in jail, allows Alves to leave prison if he pays the bail, with the obligation to surrender his two passports - Spanish and Brazilian - not to leave Spain and to report to the court every week.

The main reason given by the Barcelona Court of Appeal for granting bail was that the risk of flight associated with the severity of the sentence had "diminished" after the defendant had been sentenced to four and a half years' imprisonment. 

The ratio between years of imprisonment, preventive detention (14 months) and the remainder of the sentence is in favour of the Brazilian. At most, the provisional detention could be extended until the halfway point of the sentence, but there will be "hardly" a final sentence during this period, he warns, which is why it was decided to grant bail.

Another point in favour of bail was that the convicted person "has expressed his firm intention to remain at the disposal of the court at all times", as "he has done since the beginning of the proceedings". It was not insignificant that Alves travelled to Spain, where he currently lives, and "voluntarily" turned himself in to the authorities when he learned that he was being investigated for the rape of a young woman in the Sutton nightclub in Barcelona.

Finally, the order states that it is in accordance with the presumption of innocence, since "the effects of a hypothetical punishment cannot be anticipated in any case", as this would violate the Constitution.

As an additional penalty, the order also prohibits the defendant from coming within 1,000 metres of the victim's home, place of work or any other place she may frequent, and from communicating with her by any means. The Brazilian star's release will take effect once the defence has paid the one million euro bail demanded by the court.

He will not be able to leave prison until the money has been paid into the court's account and a new provisional release order has been issued, although this is only a matter of bureaucratic procedures and time".