The Supreme Court has appeal inadmissible filed by César, sentenced to fourteen years in prison for a continued crime of sexual assault committed against his stepdaughterMarí Trini, in Pamplona. The Second Criminal Chamber, with a presentation by Judge Ana María Ferrer García, thus confirmed the decision of the Provincial Court of Navarra, previously ratified by the Superior Court of Justice of the community, which considered the abuses that occurred during 2013 to be fully accredited.
The court rejects the arguments of the convicted person, who alleged violation of his right to the presumption of innocence, improper evaluation of the evidence and infringement of his right to defense. The Supreme Court ruling, handed down on October 9, 2025, concludes that the previous resolutions had reasoned in a coherent and well-founded manner. existence of sufficient evidencemainly the victim’s statement, corroborated by witnesses, psychological reports and a recording in which the accused himself recognized the facts.
According to proven facts, Marí Trini, 23 years old, arrived in Spain from London in March 2013 accompanied by her nine-month-old son, who was sick and in need of treatment. During his stay, he stayed at the home of his mother, Zaira, and her husband, César, who was therefore his stepfather. Taking advantage of their coexistence, the man began a pattern of repeated sexual harassment and assaulttaking advantage of his position of authority and the emotional and economic dependence of the young woman.
The court found that the abuse began with non-consensual comments and touching and soon escalated into full-blown sexual assaults. On June 6, 2013, while the victim was exercising at the family home, César approached her from behind and He penetrated her without consent. From that episode on, the attacks were repeated on a regular basis, both in the house and in the car, where the accused picked her up when she left work to force her into sexual practices. under threats and insults.
The judicial story describes a scenario of fear, control and humiliation. The aggressor prohibited her from communicating with her husband, who remained in London, and subjected her to a dynamic of sexual and psychological violence. When Marí Trini tried to resist, he reacted with slaps or threats that no one would believe her if she reported it. It was not until 2022, almost a decade later, when the victim decided to break the silence and file a complaint.
The Provincial Court of Navarra granted full credibility to Marí Trini’s testimony, describing it as coherent, persistent and without contradictions. The victim, the Court explained, had justified the delay in reporting due to fear, shame and family dependency, common factors in cases of intra-family sexual assault.
The court stressed that his account found support in various objective tests: a letter-complaint presented from the first moment, the testimony of her husband, several witnesses who confirmed the isolation she suffered, and especially a recording provided by the victim herself, in which the accused uttered the phrase “until I raped you.” Three Bulgarian interpreters confirmed at the trial that the verb used in the audio had no other meaning than the literal one, discarding the defense argument that sought to attribute a metaphorical or ironic meaning to it.
Likewise, a psychological expert report confirmed that the woman had sequelae compatible with the events reported: symptoms of depression, shame and social isolationderived mainly from the abuses suffered. The coroners explained that it was not unusual for victims of sexual assault to take years to report, especially when there is a family link with the aggressor.
In its order, the Supreme Court recalls that the function of cassation is not to re-evaluate personal evidence, but rather to examine the logical coherence of the evaluation carried out by the lower courts. In this sense, the Chamber emphasizes that both the Court and the Superior Court of Justice of Navarra had reasoned in a “logical, motivated and reasonable” manner, without detecting any arbitrariness.
Regarding the alleged violation of the accusatory principle, the Supreme Court rejects that the accused suffered defenselessness. It points out that the element of “prevalence”—that is, the taking advantage of a position of superiority derived from cohabitation and kinship by affinity—was discussed and debated in the oral trial, and that the accusations had already included, since their provisional conclusions, the aggravated subtype provided for in article 180.1.4º of the Penal Code.
