The Supreme Court upheld the one-and-a-half-year prison sentence imposed on a military sailor The crime of harassment, coercion, and sexual assault against a female colleague continuesWhile they were both studying at the Antonio de Escanio School of Specializations … From ferol. The Military Chamber of the Supreme Court ruled, in a final ruling issued on October 16, to completely reject the appeal filed by the convict against the decision of the Fourth Regional Military Court dated February 12, 2025.
The facts declared to be proven date back to the beginning of 2023. The convict confessed despite the explicit refusal of the victim. A campaign of insistence and undesirable approaches began. The situation escalated while he was on a night out with fellow brigade members at a bar in Ferrol. There, the accused rubbed the victim with insistence.”He touched her ass repeatedly and grabbed her hips.“Forcing her to intervene with her arm to push him away,” according to the sentence. When she left the building, in a drunken state, the man approached her aggressively, uttering phrases such as, “You daughter of a bitch, I will kill you,” which frightened the young woman, who… She had to be accompanied home by other colleagues.
The next day, the accused sent a WhatsApp message to the victim admitting his behaviour. However, in the following months he continued his behavior, sending messages and calls until the infected person blocked him. In the face of siege, The convicted man sent semi-nude audio clips and videos to the victim’s then-partnerwith insulting comments and sexual connotations. This situation created a state of “nervousness, worry, and anxiety” among the student sailor, fearing for her personal safety. The soldier was sentenced to six months’ imprisonment for committing the crime of military coercion, and to one year’s imprisonment for each of the other two crimes: Sexual Assault in the Military and Sexual Assault in Regular Penal Code. In addition, a ban on approaching within 1,000 meters of the victim and a ban on contacting him by any means during the punishment period were imposed as subsidiary penalties. He was also ordered to pay 5,000 euros in compensation for moral damage.
The Supreme Court analyzed and rejected the reasons given by the convicted man’s defense in his appeal one by one. Among the rejected arguments, it is worth highlighting this The convicted man claimed that he was no longer a soldier when he was tried. The Supreme Court recalled that jurisdiction is determined by the military situation at the time the acts were committed, and not during the trial. The appellant also claimed that, Occurring in a bar on a Saturday night cannot be considered a service situation. The court settled the issue by recalling its principle: Cadets in military posts subject to the boarding system, as it were, are required to wear a uniform during their permitted outings, which maintains the link to the service and extends military jurisdiction to those contexts.
The Supreme Court considered that the ruling of the lower court was based on “direct and sufficient evidence of the charge.” Victim testimony described as “logical, coherent and credible”And a number of witnesses who confirmed the facts. The Chamber stresses that it is not its responsibility to re-evaluate the credibility of witnesses, which is a task that belongs to the court that saw and heard the intervenors. The Supreme Court upheld the decision of the lower court, which appreciated the similar mitigating factor of intoxication, but did not fully justify it, because it had not been proven that the accused’s intellectual and volitional capabilities were lost during the commission of the incidents. With this decision, The Supreme Court concludes a model ruling in the military fieldStrengthen the protection of victims of sexual harassment and assault within the armed forces and clearly define the concept of “service work” for individuals undergoing training.
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