Football: Neymar's father says he will not pay Dani Alves' one million euro bail

The father of Brazilian soccer superstar Neymar denied Thursday that he would pay a million-euro bail for the release of his son's former teammate Dani Alves, imprisoned in Spain for rape.

In a statement published on Instagram, Neymar da Silva Santos denied information from several Spanish media, according to which Alves would have once again resorted to financial help from the family of the man he worked with at FC Barcelona, ​​at Paris SG and in selection. Neymar da Silva Santos admitted in January to having paid 150,000 euros to help the former full-back pay his legal fees, a few weeks before the latter was sentenced to 4 and a half years in prison.

“It is common knowledge that, initially, I helped Dani Alves,” he recalled at the start of the press release published Thursday, in Portuguese and English. “Now, when the situation is different, when the Spanish justice system has already decided for a conviction, some are speculating and trying to associate my name and that of my son with a subject which is no longer our responsibility” , assures Neymar senior.

On Wednesday, a Barcelona court authorized the release of Dani Alves on payment of one million euros, pending his appeal judgment. Failing to have paid this bail before the daily deadline for this type of approach on Thursday, the Brazilian will remain at least one additional night in the prison where he has been detained since January 2023. “I hope that Daniel will find within his family all the answers he is looking for. For us, for our family, the subject is closed. Full stop!” insisted Neymar’s father.

Brazilian President Luiz Inacio Lula da Silva said Wednesday that "the money that Daniel Alves has, the money that someone could lend him, cannot redeem the offense of a man against a woman he raped.” Alves was sentenced on February 22 to four and a half years of imprisonment for the rape of a young woman on the night of December 30 to 31, 2022 in a nightclub in Barcelona, ​​a sentence much lower than the requisitions of the prosecution, which called for nine years in prison. In addition to the payment of this bail of one million euros, the court had set as conditions for his release from prison the confiscation of his two Spanish and Brazilian passports, the obligation to report to court every week, the ban on leaving Spain, as well as the ban on approaching the victim and communicating with them.