Tom Ewart Smith
REAL Madrid started wonderkid Raul Asencio last night just hours after he lost an appeal to have a child pornography case thrown out in Spain.
Asencio is under investigation for the alleged dissemination of a sexually explicit video involving a minor, punishable by a sentence of between one and five years in prison.
Despite the charges and allegations against the 21-year-old, he was allowed to play a vital Champions League match against Manchester City, sparking some backlash online.
Speaking on X, one user said: “When will he be convicted? Because justice is very slow when someone from Madrid is involved.”
Another wrote under Asencio’s victory tweet: “You should be in jail”, while one said: “Any other player would be in prison, it doesn’t make sense.”
In June 2023, Asencio allegedly received a video containing explicit sexual content of a minor under the age of 16.
Two of his teammates from Madrid’s youth academy had a sexual encounter with two girls in the town of Mogan in Gran Canaria.
They allegedly recorded the sexual relationships they had with the two girls, one of them a minor.
Another footballer was present and the images were allegedly distributed by Asencio when he received them via mobile.
The three youth-team players are Andres Garcia, Ferran Ruiz, and Juan Rodriguez.
The recordings were carried out non-consensually and Asencio showed the video to a third person without the girls’ permission.
Yesterday, before the Champions League match, the Las Palmas Court rejected an appeal filed by the player’s defendants against the ruling of the Provincial Court.
The court will continue the investigation against Asencio for the alleged dissemination of a video with explicit sexual content of a minor under 16 years of age.
The court has concluded that he not only incurs the crime of discovery and revelation of secrets, but also that of child pornography, for which he could see one to five years of prison if the video was shown to a third party.
The case began following a complaint filed in Gran Canaria by a woman after discovering that a video of her 16-year-old daughter having sex was circulating on WhatsApp.
