STJ minister orders seizure of Robinho’s passport

Minister Francisco Falcão, of the Superior Court of Justice (STJ), ordered the seizure of the former player’s passport Robinho39, ultimately sentenced in Italian court to nine years in prison for rape.

The process at the STJ deals with the validation of the conviction and the analysis of the possibility of the former player serving his sentence in Brazil. In his decision, Falcão determined that the passport will have to be delivered within five days and that Robinho will not be able to leave the country.

The request was initially made to the STJ by the Brazilian Union of Women (UBM), an entity that participates in the lawsuit against the player as an interested party. The UBN requested that the passport be withheld to ensure the “application of Brazilian law, in view of the risk of frustration in complying with the decision with the departure of the defendant [Robinho] of the national territory”.

Afterwards, the Federal Public Ministry also made the request, which was answered by Falcão.

“It is up to the judge to guarantee the useful result of the judicial provision. Among the legal alternatives, one must choose the one that, at the same time, represents, on the one hand, the greatest effectiveness and, on the other, the least interference in the freedom of the interested party “, said the minister, in his decision.

“In this direction, while this request for approval is being processed, it is convenient to set different precautions for the prison to guarantee a possible future decision complying with the request for execution of the sentence in national territory”, he continued.

“The defendant was sentenced to a penalty of another year in prison, by a final and unappealable decision abroad, for committing a serious crime with international repercussions, and has a socioeconomic condition that allows for possible evasion of Brazilian jurisdiction, which authorizes the enactment of the measure exceptional.”

According to an investigation by the Italian Public Ministry, Robinho and five other Brazilians committed group sexual violence against a woman of Albanian origin, who was drunk by them and, unconscious, taken to the dressing room of a nightclub in Milan, where she was raped several times.

Because they left Italy during the investigation, the other four men could not be notified, and their case was dropped from the process.

Robinho has always denied the crime and his defense points out flaws in the process that would not have been taken into account at the trial.