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The Spanish Football Association filed a complaint for incitement to hatred, which the police cited as the reason for their arrest, which took place on October 14 and 15.
Four people have been arrested for running a coordinated campaign of hate speech against Real Madrid’s Brazilian player Vinicius Junior before the Madrid derby between Real and Atlético on September 29, Spanish police announced, Hina reports.
According to the Spanish media, they are Atlético fans, and they are considered the “alleged initiators” of the #metropolitanoconmascarillas campaign, which went viral on social networks where they invited people to come and attend the Madrid derby with surgical masks over their mouths so that they could freely insult opponents players, especially Vinicius, reports AFP.
The Spanish Football Association then filed a complaint for incitement to hatred, which the police cited as the reason for their arrest, which took place on October 14 and 15.
They are accused of encouraging fans to go to the stadium “to shout humiliating and discriminatory insults with racist connotations”, the police explained in a statement without directly naming the Brazilian striker, who has been the victim of numerous racist attacks since arriving in Spain in 2018.
In June 2023, four Atletico fans, accused of hanging a dummy with the likeness of Vinicius Junior on a bridge in the Spanish capital, were banned from stadiums for two years by the Spanish authorities. The criminal proceedings against them are still ongoing.
The perennial problem of racism
A fan of the Spanish club Mallorca was sentenced on September 26 to 12 months in prison and a three-year stadium ban for racist insults directed at Real Madrid star and former Villarreal player Samuel Chukwueze.
This was the third criminal conviction handed down in recent months for racist abuse against Real Madrid players, including Vinicius Junior.
Three Valencia fans were sentenced on June 10 to eight months in prison for chanting racist abuse at their club’s stadium in May 2023, already directed at the Brazilian striker.
The incidents, which sparked a wave of international outrage, ignited a debate in Spain, where incidents of racism have been common in football stadiums for decades, despite the work of the authorities.
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