The San Bartolomé Football Club has announced the signing of the Canarian footballer Joel Domínguez, 22 years old, definitively convicted of a crime of gender-based violence against his ex-partner when she was a minor.
The decision, which has been communicated by the club through its social networks, has sparked the indignation of part of the Lanzarote fanbase and has forced the club to hide comments on social media. However, the team does not plan to revoke the contract.
"The boy already served his time and paid, I don't understand why he shouldn't move forward," defends the president of San Bartolomé CF, Juan Elvira, in statements to La Voz, who advocates for "the player's right to reintegration." "When there is gender-based violence, it seems to weigh more than a robbery or a murder," he adds.
The gender-based violence case for which Joel Domínguez was convicted became widely known because it was uncovered when he was a youth player for Unión Deportiva Las Palmas. In March 2023, Domínguez pleaded guilty to pushing, kicking, and grabbing his underage partner in a scene witnessed by several bystanders, including an off-duty police officer, as reported by the Agencia Efe.
When the abuser was sentenced to forty days of community service for gender-based violence and was issued a two-year restraining order against his ex-partner, the club suspended him from group training for forty days in March 2023, relegating him to solo training, but did not terminate his contract.
That same summer, Unión Deportiva Las Palmas had announced that the athlete, who until then played in the youth category, would participate in pre-season training with the first team, but after receiving a wave of criticism from the fanbase, they decided to terminate his contract in July of the same year for "disciplinary reasons."
In October 2024, the footballer, who was playing for Unión Sur Yaiza, was convicted of a crime of breach of sentence for violating the restraining order and the prohibition of communicating with the victim, who resides in Gran Canaria. This summer, he has once again come into the spotlight because he shared private messages he had with the victim via Instagram.
016 telephone line for victims of gender-based violence and their families
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