Young people admit to having made gestures to Vini Jr at Mestalla, but deny insults

Two of the three young people, aged between 18 and 21, detained as alleged authors of the racist insults to which Brazilian player Vinícius Júnior, from Real Madrid, was subjected in Valencia, admitted to the judge that they made gestures to the striker in response to some alleged provocations, although they denied having uttered any insults.

The holder of the Investigative Court 10 of Valencia heard this Monday (19) the testimony of two of the three young people, who only answered the questions of their lawyers and one of them also those of the judge.

The testimony of the third of the young people accused of these same facts was postponed to July 11, after having admitted the request for postponement to the instructor.

As found out by EFE Agency together with sources in the case, the two young men admitted to having made gestures – they did not detail which gestures, although they were identified by the recordings of the match – from the stands of the Mestalla stadium; and added that they did so as part of a joint reaction by a large part of the Valencian fans against what they understood as provocations by Vinícius.

The same sources explained that one of the youths insisted that no gestures or insults were directed at any player other than Vini Jr.

As he left the court, the lawyer for the accused whose testimony was postponed, Manuel Izquierdo, insisted that “it was taken out of context, it was a one-off problem, they are three young people, they don’t belong to any radical group, they are normal people, this has nothing to do with to do with hate crime”.

In his opinion, “these young people have been taken as scapegoats for a general cause against racism, and what these three boys are accused of could be accused by many other spectators, who were sitting even in other more noble areas of the stadium. ”.

This lawyer explained that the accused also do not recognize the interpretation of contempt for reasons of race that is made of the gesture they made.

In that same sense, the lawyer for the second of the accused and later today, Juana Blázquez, considered that this case should be reduced to alleged insults, since in her opinion her client did not express any feelings of hatred and highlighted that “it was clearly seen that (Vinicius) was provoking the stadium and even confronted the crowd”.

The prosecutor specializing in hate crimes, Susana Gisbert, the three defense lawyers and the La Liga lawyer, as the entity promoting the complaint and the private prosecution, were present at the statement.

The lawyer for the Spanish Football Federation also heard statements remotely, although the videoconference had technical difficulties.

The court should hear the Brazilian player on the 27th, who was offered to give his testimony by videoconference, and in this same act it is foreseeable that he will be offered the possibility of being part of the process as a victim.

On the 26th, testimony will be heard from the security guards who worked in Mestalla on the day of departure.

As a private accusation, LaLiga presented the investigating judge with several videos of Real Madrid’s arrival at the Mestalla that apparently reinforce the thesis of the racist insult to Vinícius Júnior and that could lead to legal proceedings for the events that also occurred outside the stadium and in the extension of the process investigative.

As LaLiga reflects in the expansion of the complaint, this was done after learning that the case – provided by the Public Ministry – contained two disks with recordings outside the stadium and that showed facts that are not those being investigated in this process.

Several screenshots are attached to the complaint in which several young people can be identified shouting the onomatopoeia “uh, uh, uh” or chanting “you are a monkey” and “Vinícius, you are a monkey”.

In this expansion of the complaint, a publication of the Ultra Yomus profile on Twitter is also attached, in which the fans are invited to welcome the team and indicate to the investigating judge that this group is currently located in the extreme north, in the same bleachers where the fans investigated for racist insults were.