She doesn't know if it was a smell, the feeling of coldness of body and spirit, but on January 24, 2014, Marta Plujà says she almost had to die to be reborn. That day she suffered a stroke that helped her, definitively, to “wake up” and “break the silence” that she had carried since she was very young without even knowing it. She also doesn't know when the sexual assaults and rapes by a relative began or ended. She calculates it based on the aggressor's biography, who is 10 years older and was already of legal age. “I would have been 9, 10, 11 years old,” she says.

"We were taken to an open field [...]. The first man raped me twice; the second, once, and the third, four more times. The fourth also raped me once". "All the way, the militiamen asked the women to follow them and insisted when we refused. It happened everywhere. In the woods: two militiamen there, three more after a while. They were everywhere. Everything happened in broad daylight".Testimonies as chilling as these are common in the Darfur region, in Sudan, where in a couple of weeks it will be three years since the country has been immersed in a devastating civil war.

Over the past year, a new specialization has emerged in the courts, focused on investigating crimes in which the victims are children or adolescents. This has raised several questions about the limits of its jurisdiction and remains a source of disagreement between the judiciary and the Public Prosecutor's Office. The law that designed this specialty It did not specify, for example, whether sexual assaults against girls should fall under these new courts or under those specializing in violence against women, to which The same judicial reform assigned jurisdiction over all sexual offenses.The reform also failed to stipulate who should handle cases of sexual assault against girls reported years later, when the victims are adults, as a Barcelona judge has now raised in a ruling obtained by ARA. Within the judiciary and the Public Prosecutor's Office, there were differing opinions in this debate. On the one hand, some argued that sexual violence against girls should be investigated by the same courts that handle sexual assaults against adults. So far this year, as a result of this same reform, courts specializing in violence against women have jurisdiction over all sexual violence, not just domestic violence, as was the case previously. On the other hand, other legal experts warned that this would mean that sexual assaults against minors would have to be referred to different courts depending on whether the victim was a boy or a girl: boys would go to juvenile courts and girls to courts specializing in violence against women. Another argument in favor of leaving all cases in the hands of the new child abuse courts is their specialization and the fact that they utilize resources such as the Barnahus, where children can be interviewed by psychologists and educators in a less hostile environment than a courtroom.

The Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) are investigating two sexual assaults in Sant Joan de les Abadesses, in the Ripollès region. The two incidents are not believed to be related, although they occurred five days apart in a town of just over 3,000 inhabitants. Municipal sources admit that the town is shocked, and the City Council has called for a protest this Friday at 6 p.m. in the Plaça Major (Main Square). The first sexual assault took place on the night of February 26-27 at a residence in the town. A young woman, over 18, reported that she had been assaulted by a young man. The Mossos are already investigating this case, which has not yet resulted in any arrests. Initially, it appears that the complainant and the alleged perpetrator knew each other. The second assault occurred this Wednesday night on the street in a residential area of ​​Sant Joan. The victim is a middle-aged woman who, according to her report, was assaulted by a young man. The assailant allegedly held her captive and threatened her with a knife, which caused several cuts. During the assault, the man allegedly groped her, but the woman managed to escape and call emergency services. The victim was taken to the hospital, where she was treated for superficial cuts.

The journalist Mar Bermúdez (Barcelona, ​​1998) goes report your boss in The MainThe former director of Catalunya Ràdio, Saúl Gordillo, was arrested in December 2022 for sexual assault. A case that would end in sentencing Two years later. And in 2025, Gordillo agreed to a sentence of one and a half years in prison for the sexual assault of a second female employee of the media outlet he directed in 2022. The MainNow Bermúdez recounts the experience he had in The sins of a feminist: the awakening of a journalistic #MeToo movement (Ara Llibres), a book that narrates, from a feminist perspective and with a structure based on the seven deadly sins, what it means to denounce a powerful person with influential friends. Which is the worst deadly sin?

The National Police have arrested three minors between the ages of 14 and 15 for raping a minor girl. The assault occurred on February 10 in Valencia, but the arrests were made this Monday, and the detainees have been placed at the disposal of the Juvenile Prosecutor's Office. Another minor, this one 13 years old, is also implicated, but for theHis age makes him not criminally responsible The four are being investigated for sexual assault with penetration and for a crime against privacy and disclosure of secrets, because they allegedly disseminated images of the rape. The Juvenile Prosecutor's Office has ordered that the detainees be released on probation with a prohibition on communicating with or approaching the victim. Since they are minors, the police have not released further details about the circumstances of the rape. According to reports The ProvincesThe complainant is 16 years old and a classmate of the alleged perpetrators. The rape occurred in a shopping mall in the city. The four minors also allegedly recorded the rape and showed the images to other classmates. According to the newspaper, during their statements to the police and later to the prosecutor's office, the detainees claimed the encounters were consensual. One of them admitted to penetrating the victim, while the other two only stated they entered the bathroom while the assault was taking place. After giving their statements, the Juvenile Prosecutor's Office granted supervised release to the three arrested minors and imposed a restraining order prohibiting them from contacting the girl or approaching within 50 meters of her.

After a trial that made headlines around the world and sentenced her ex-husband to 20 years for drugging her and handing her over to a hundred men to be raped, Gisèle Pelicot publishes her memoirs this Tuesday. A hymn in life (Now Books). The book, originally written in French, is being published simultaneously in more than twenty countries and has been translated into 22 languages, a rare feat in the publishing world. "I have rarely been the first editor of a book translated into 22 languages. It is also unique in that it is a book with a significant social impact," explained Sophie de Closets, the book's editor and president of Flammarion, the French publishing house that has put 150,000 copies on sale, on BFMTV.

Gisèle Pelicot, The French woman whose husband drugged her with medication so that at least a hundred men could rape her while she was unconsciousShe breaks her silence more than a year after the trial that sentenced Dominique Pelicot to the maximum penalty of twenty years in prison. The woman has not given any interviews or participated in any public events since the trial. It made her a role model for feminismBut he is about to publish his memoir, A hymn in life (Ara Llibres), in which she recounts her love story with Pelicot, the shock of discovering the truth, and everything that followed.

France has uncovered a new case of a serial rapist targeting children and teenagers. The public prosecutor's office announced on Tuesday that a 79-year-old man has confessed to sexually assaulting 89 minors, all boys, between the ages of 13 and 17 at the time of the crimes, which he allegedly committed between 1967 and 2022 in various countries. The pedophile, born in Annecy, was arrested more than two years ago, but the case had not been made public until now. The Grenoble prosecutor's office decided to release the information—without providing details of the case. modus operandi of the rapist—to try to find all the victims. So far, only half have been identified.

The story of Jeffrey Epstein is not just that of a pedophile who ran a prostitution ring catering to wealthy men worldwide. It is also a story of money, politics, and above all, power. Epstein used sex to buy favors and influence, but also to obtain information and increase his fortune. The American magnate, who committed suicide in 2019 in a New York prison, had a network of accomplices who procured young models and minors for him. But he was also the mastermind behind the scheme. What did the wealthy men who came to him want? He provided it and opened the doors of the island to them. Little Saint James: a paradise in the Caribbean where he invited some of the most influential people on the planet and where some of these men assaulted and raped dozens of minors.

For the past year, the cities of Barcelona and Hospitalet de Llobregat have had a dedicated on-call forensic service exclusively for victims of sexual violence. The professionals working in this unique service, the only one of its kind in Spain, have carried out 661 interventions during this first year. This means they have attended to an average of two victims per day. Of all the interventions they have performed since February 1, 2025, 46 have involved victims of multiple assaults. The annual tally of 611 interventions represents a 3.9% increase compared to the forensic medical examinations for sexual violence carried out during the previous year, before this specific 24-hour on-call service existed. Until then, examinations of victims of sexual violence were handled by an on-call service that also dealt with other serious incidents. The Institute of Legal Medicine and Forensic Sciences of Catalonia (IMLCFC), which reports to the Department of Justice, is headquartered in the City of Justice, on the border between Barcelona and Hospitalet. This Sunday, coinciding with its first anniversary, it released data on its on-call service for sexual violence cases. In fact, the upward trend in cases of this crime "has been steadily increasing for years," with the sole exception of 2020 due to the COVID-19 pandemic, explained IMLCFC Director Eneko Barberia. Younger women and more men are among the victims.

The majority of victims seen by the forensic experts on this specialized duty are young women under 30. Specifically, the average age is 28.2 years. Although the number of men seen is very small compared to women (representing one in seven victims), the forensic experts are seeing an increasing number of them. Last year, men made up 13.9% of the victims seen, compared to 11.9% the previous year. In total, last year the forensic experts saw 573 women and 88 men. The data collected during 2025 also confirms another trend that the forensic experts had already noticed in previous years. Sexual assaults are increasingly less concentrated in the summer months, as was previously the case, and there are more cases at other times of the year. However, there are still more assaults on weekends, highlighting the correlation between nightlife, alcohol consumption, and sexual violence.

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The Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) have dismantled a criminal network exploiting women for sex in clandestine brothels in Barcelona and Paris. The victims were forced into prostitution at any time of day and were also required to sell or use drugs with clients if they so desired. After nearly a year and a half of investigation, the police have arrested the woman who ran the brothels, and eight other people are under investigation in connection with the case. The arrested woman allegedly led the network along with her partner and her mother. Other women were also involved, managing the brothels, where the victims were monitored by closed-circuit video surveillance. The investigation began in September 2024 following the testimony of a woman who told officers from the human trafficking unit that she had worked for months as a receptionist in various clandestine brothels in Barcelona where women were being sexually exploited. The Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) explained in a statement this Sunday that this witness recounted how the women were forced into prostitution, "with complete availability and subjected to cyber-control," with a video surveillance system in the apartments. The case has been taken over by agents from the human trafficking unit under the direction of the Prosecutor's Office for Immigration and Human Trafficking. The initial stages of the investigation already indicated that the network was run by the arrested woman, her partner, and her mother, while other women were responsible for monitoring the apartments. The initial inquiries also led agents to suspect that the network itself might control brothels in other European capitals. Key testimonies

In early 2025, the police identified one of the exploited women, who explained that she had traveled to Spain to work as a prostitute on her own. She did so for a few months, until a woman promised her better pay and greater security if she worked as a prostitute in a Barcelona apartment run by an acquaintance. The promise was a deception, and the woman who met her in Barcelona saddled her with an exorbitant debt for the trip there. From then on, she forced her to prostitute herself and sell drugs to her clients. Following this testimony, investigators found a second victim who had been in the same situation before managing to escape. Over time, the group's leader closed the apartments she used as clandestine brothels in Barcelona and shifted the women to working in hotels or at clients' homes. The investigation has also confirmed that the woman opened a brothel in an apartment in Paris's 15th arrondissement and transferred at least four of the victims she had already exploited in Barcelona. To attract clients, the arrested woman posted advertisements on various internet portals and at one point had around seventy active listings. She advertised on websites offering sex work not only in Spain and France, but also in Switzerland—where she resided for a month—Italy, Luxembourg, and Germany. Police have carried out three raids in Barcelona and seized fifteen cell phones belonging to the women who ran the brothels, as well as other items that are currently being analyzed.

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France was one of the first European countries to legalize abortion and where women's liberation was most intensely experienced, especially in the late 1960s and throughout the 1970s, after May '68. But half a century later, its Civil Code continues to establish sexist principles inappropriate for the 21st century, which have resulted in such surreal rulings as the supposed obligation of spouses to have sexual relations.

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A hospital orderly at Bellvitge Hospital, OMV, will appear in court this week at the Barcelona Provincial Court as the alleged perpetrator of repeated sexual abuse of a patient. According to information obtained by ARA, the events date back to the summer of 2020, and the complainant, an adult, was hospitalized in the eating disorders unit at Bellvitge, a center of the Catalan Health Institute (ICS) of the Generalitat of Catalonia. She suffered from severe anorexia. In its indictment, the Public Prosecutor's Office is requesting a nine-year prison sentence for the orderly. The private prosecution, representing the complainant, is seeking a ten-year sentence. The ICS, which is subsidiarily liable for any future compensation, as well as the defendant's legal team, are requesting acquittal.

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The High Court of Justice of Catalonia (TSJC) has upheld the conviction of Xavier Padial, the confessed pedophile of Barberà del VallèsSentenced to 57 years in prison for repeatedly torturing and sexually abusing two of his cousins, both minors, and forcing one of them into prostitution. "We do not believe that the compensation awarded makes up for what the victims have suffered at the hands of the defendant, and much less that it is disproportionate," states the ruling, which ARA has accessed, and which confirms one of the highest compensations for sexual violence ever awarded by the State. The court awarded €80,000 to the other girl—who suffered abuse from the age of 6 or 7 and prostituted herself under his influence—and €80,000 to the third girl, who also suffered sexual abuse. The court thus rejected the appeal filed by Padial's defense, who also produced child pornography with material obtained from sexual encounters with Laura. "There is no disproportionality whatsoever. The facts are so serious, and their consequences so grave, that we can only agree with the court's decision," reads the document that upholds the sentence handed down in June 2025 by Section 21 of the Provincial Court of Barcelona. During the trial, held in October 2024, the prosecution held the defendant responsible for the "torture" that Laura suffered for 11 years. The harrowing account of the young woman, who testified when she was 23, and who had received threats and coercion, led the prosecution to conclude that Padial had completely "brainwashed" his cousin, turning her into "a toy in the defendant's hands." The victim recounted to the court how, before meeting with clients, her cousin, who was twice her age, would "prepare" and sexually abuse her: "I had to have sex with him to perform well with the clients."

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It's sad to read the witnesses of the women who denounce the alleged abuses of Julio Iglesias published by Eldiario.es and not feel surprised, that the events explained are perfectly plausible, that they don't surprise us in the slightest. Which doesn't prevent, of course, the shock caused by some chilling details about the system of exploitation to which he subjected his victims. We could have easily deduced, from how he spoke of the ladies and how he treated them in public, that the Latin lover He was, in reality, an unscrupulous predator. But that's how these inveterate seducers are; they can't help it. They have such sexual prowess that they have to go around the world sleeping with anyone who crosses their path. It was one of the things the singer was admired for worldwide: for being a conqueror without anyone questioning what his conquests thought. And what must they have thought? What an honor, what a privilege to be chosen by a man who could have them all, with success, money, and power. What could they say, barely reached adulthood, when, in the middle of an interview, he made comments about their appearance, asked them if they had a boyfriend, or planted a kiss right on their lips? With the scandal of the accusations, television networks have compiled the most shocking moments of the man, because they constitute outright assaults committed live before an audience that laughs, applauds, and celebrates this normalized violence. Who could say a word if he was like that? You know, men. Seeing the images of kisses reminded me of all the disgusting strangers, the flexibility women's necks acquire from doing the cobra, all the strategies we've had to adopt to avoid those who think they're good lovers when they don't have the slightest idea what good sex means, which always begins with...

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When MP Laetitia Saint-Paul read an article published in February of last year by a regional newspaper in Angers, Le Courrier del OuestRegarding the sexual assaults suffered by a young female soldier, she was speechless. Another soldier had subjected her to some sixty sexual assaults over several months, while both were participating in different naval missions in French waters. The soldier, who confessed to the acts, was sentenced by a military court to only 10 days of arrest and a fine of 600 euros. Suffering from post-traumatic stress, she had to leave the army.

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This week we presented the main findings of the Survey on Sexual Violence by the Department of the Interior. These are alarming figures that should shake anyone to their core, but at the same time, they allow us to construct a clear picture of the serious problem and the impact of this violence. The fact that two out of every three Catalan women (67.3%) have suffered sexual violence at some point in their lives, and that 15.5% have experienced it in the last year, definitively shatters the myth that sexual violence is exceptional or circumstantial. It is structural, persistent, and deeply rooted, and even today, only 6% of those affected report it. This violence, as the data indicates, transcends generations, public and private spaces, and intimate relationships, and it remains silenced. This silence is not resignation or passivity on the part of women, but rather a response to institutional distrust, the difficulty in identifying situations of violence (many of which are normalized and internalized), and a reflection of the fear of reprisals and the social burden that still falls on those who suffer it in the form of guilt or shame.

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Feminism emerged in 2018 from social movements at the forefront of the media and social agenda —that year saw the first global feminist strike in history— thanks to the Me Too movement denouncing sexual harassment, which originated in Hollywood and spread like wildfire. In Spain, the trigger was the street protests against the La Manada case. Feminism advances in waves, and we are now in the fourth wave, which has the denunciation of sexual violence as a key element. Me Too connected us as women and shattered the illusion of equality: "It was an awakening. Despite many decades of equality policies and equality in formal terms, attitudes of sexual violence continue to be reproduced underneath," argues Maria Freixenet, a researcher at the Institute of Political and Social Sciences ( The neo-machista backlash after the fourth wave of feminism, signed by several academics.

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A 51-year-old man has been remanded in custody for sexually assaulting a 91-year-old woman in Garriguella, in the Alt Empordà region. The Figueres duty court made the decision after the Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) arrested him on November 5th, accused of raping an elderly woman. The incident occurred on November 2nd. The arrested man and the victim are residents of this small village of fewer than a thousand inhabitants, where everyone knows each other. The victim's family filed a rape complaint. According to sources consulted by ARA, the assault involved penetration, although the victim did not suffer injuries. The man has a criminal record, but none related to sexual offenses. Gaining the victim's trust is a prime example of his modus operandi.

Sources indicate that the man gained the victim's trust before forcing himself on her in her home. The Mossos d'Esquadra (Catalan police) quickly identified the suspect, who was arrested early Wednesday morning. He appeared before a judge on Friday. The judge heard statements from the suspect, the victim, and several witnesses. She ultimately ordered him held in pretrial detention without bail. The case is open for a charge of sexual assault.

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