Jenni Hermoso declares in the trial against Luis Rubiales

“I felt that I was out of context totally (…) I was kissing my boss and this does not happen, it should not happen in any social or labor field,” said beautiful, first witness to the judgment of the former president of the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) that started this Monday.

“I felt little respected,” said Hermoso, who declared in a quiet voice for more than two hours in the court located in San Fernando de Henares, on the outskirts of Madrid.

Rubiales, in a dark suit and sitting with his lawyer, is accused of sexual assault for the kiss and coercion for the footballer to apologize for the gesture, crimes for which the Prosecutor’s Office requests 2.5 years in prison.

“A kiss on the lips, (I give it) only when I decided to do it,” the player settled to the prosecutor’s questions. “They stained one of the happiest days of my life, and for me it is very important to say that at no time I looked for that act, much less I expected it,” he added.

“Let me leave me alone”

The scandal broke out in the eyes of the entire world on August 23, 2023, when the players of the Spanish team, after winning the World Cup in Sydney, reached the podium for the medals.

When congratulating beautiful, number 10, Rubiales grabbed his head with both hands and planted a kiss on his lips.

The gesture went viral in networks and generated indignation reactions worldwide, but Rubiales clung to the position despite a suspension of FIFA and the multiplication of the calls to resign, even from the Government of Spain.

Finally, he resigned in September 2023.

The former director of the Women’s Red, Jorge Vilda, and two former RFEF, Rubén Rivera and Albert Luque, are also prosecuted for the coercion to Hermos, a crime for which the Prosecutor’s Office asks for for them a year and a half in jail.

Beautiful explained that he ended up fed up with the “countless” times they asked him to make a statement or a video to justify the facts, until he asked to leave it “alone.”

Asked by lawyers of the defendants why he continued celebrating the victory in the World Cup after the kiss, he said: “My attitude (…) does not take away what I feel and (…) I do not even have to be crying in a room nor have I thrown to the ground when the event passed to imply that I did not like it. “

A life in “stand by” since then

“I felt unprotected” by the Federation, added the former player of Barcelona, ​​who said he was “fear of going down the street” when he returned to Spain for the media attention of the case.

He found “there in Mexico” shelter, where he played in Pachuca, “being so far,” he said.

Even so, and “until today, my life seems to have been in ‘Stand By’,” he added.

Beautiful was “fed up” when, after the forced kiss, managers of the Federation showed him a statement, later sent to journalists, who “took some importance to the incident” and was written as if she had written it, Patricia said Pérez Requena, Press Chief of the RFEF, who also testified on Monday.

Rubiales has always described the gesture as “a piquito”-a kiss on the lips-between friends but, for the Prosecutor’s Office, he imposed it “in a surprising way and without consent or acceptance of the player.”

“Not even anymore kiss, no more sexual assault,” the Minister of Equality of the leftist government, Ana Redondo, who thanked the “courage” of beautiful.

The trial will run until February 19 and include a large number of witnesses, from several beautiful companions, such as the double golden ball Alexia Putellas, the male coach Luis de la Fuente, which will compare this Tuesday.

Rubiales, 47, will declare as of February 12.

Rubiales is also judicially investigated for alleged corruption and irregular contracts during its presidency of the RFEF, between 2018 and 2023.