The Second Section of the Provincial Court of Las Palmas has sentenced Jorge Manuel Bethencourt Cravid to 6 years and 6 months in prison for sexually assaulting his ex-partner in Arrecife on April 11, 2012. It also prohibits him from approaching within 500 meters of the victim and communicating with her for 12 years. The convicted man will have to compensate his ex-partner with 10,000 euros and pay the costs of the judicial process.
The Chamber has also agreed to impose a "supervised release measure to be executed after serving the custodial sentence, which will last for five years." The precautionary measures ordered during the procedure are also maintained, that is, he will continue in provisional prison, until a final judgment is issued.
In its judicial resolution, the Chamber considers that the aggravating circumstance of kinship and the mitigating circumstance of undue delays concur in the defendant, since five years have elapsed from the commission of the events to the holding of the trial.
Proven facts
The sentence considers it proven that Jorge Manuel Bethencourt Cravid waited for his partner on the morning of April 11, 2012 when she was leaving her son at school and invited her to accompany her to his home to talk about their divorce. When she arrived at the defendant's house, he grabbed her arm tightly and, already in the bedroom, pushed her onto the bed. "With the purpose of satisfying his sexual desires", the now convicted man undressed the victim.
As the woman refused to have relations with him, "he began to hit her in various parts of the body" while telling her "you are going to be my slave". Finally, he sexually abused her. As a consequence of the blows received, the victim suffered various injuries in a part of the abdomen, in the buttocks and in the thigh.
The judicial resolution indicates that the victim initially refused to testify against Jorge Manuel Bethencourt during the trial, although at the request of the Chamber she did end up recounting the sexual assault suffered. However, it is indicated that from the first moment the victim expressed that "she did not intend, in any way, to harm the accused". Even that "she estimated that the time he had spent in pre-trial detention and in psychiatric treatment had been more than enough and that she did not want him to be sentenced to anything else."
