The Provincial Court of Santa Cruz de Tenerife has acquitted two young people who were attributed a sexual assault on a minor during the carnivals in the capital of Tenerife in 2020.
The court understands that the statements of the complainant during the trial were not entirely credible, at least to be able to conclude in a conviction and nullify the presumption of innocence, in a case in which a minor who at the time was also involved was acquitted by the corresponding Court.
In this process, the Santa Cruz de Tenerife Prosecutor’s Office He requested ten and a half years in prison. for each of the defendants and the joint payment of 10,000 euros.
The facts they took place in the early morning of February 29 when the young woman had fled her home at that time and it was later found that she was several weeks pregnant and had consumed alcohol and hashish.
The four of them knew each other because they live in the Añaza neighborhood and after engaging in a conversation they suggested that he accompany them to a house that a relative of one of the defendants had lent him during the carnivals.
In the house, one of them asked her to accompany him to a room and they had consensual sex, as the minor acknowledged.
The other two young men tried to enter the room and the first wanted to prevent it by putting a piece of wood on the door, which did not prevent them from accessing and trying to have sexual relations with the girl. In the case of one of them, it was fellatio because she said they were family, while the minor did perform it.
Since the house had no light, the young people used a mobile phone flashlight to light it, although the alleged victim came to think that they were recording a video, which was not proven, despite the fact that she assures that she saw a small part of it.
The mother of the young man who was a relative of the complainant called the girl’s mother and warned her that this recording was circulating on social networks, which she denied in court, and declared that she had said it to get the minor to tell the story. truth about what happened.
The relative who was involved in the events indicated that he actually wanted the mother of the minor to know that he had seen the minor run away and the life she was leading.
The complaint was not filed until several months later because the mother refused, since she had lived through a similar experience, “and in a neighborhood like ours, what happens to you when you file a complaint is worse than the rape itself.”
However, when the young woman went to live with her father, the latter, alarmed, urged her to go to court, with which there was a period of time that is also taken into account when questioning the girl’s version. .
Another piece of information that goes in this direction is that after the alleged events occurred, they all went together in a taxi to have breakfast, without the alleged victim appearing to show resentment or to have suffered the aforementioned attack.
He Institute of Legal Medicine of Canary Islands He concluded that the girl’s maturity was commensurate with her age, and that she presented a submissive personality, easily manageable, vulnerable, and manipulable, for which reason she is undergoing psychological treatment.
The maturity of one of the defendants was also questioned and, despite the contradictions of the other, it is concluded that it is not enough to impose a sentence.
The bulk of the accusation revolved around having had sexual relations with a minor, but given that this fact was unknown to the defendants, that she did not comment on it either, and that there is a small age difference, it was ruled out that they were sentenced for this reason.
