YouTuber sentenced for harassing the first lady of Argentina on social networks

The Argentine Justice sentenced 30 days of house arrest this Tuesday to a man accused of gender violence and discrimination for harassing the first lady of the South American country on social networks, Fabiola Yanez, according to official sources.

The accused, Eduardo Prestofelippo -a youtuber nicknamed “El Presto”-, was denounced by Yañez due to a series of publications he made in 2020 on his social networks, where he had referred to the first lady with aggravating phrases due to her status as a woman and associating her with “vip” prostitution due to her past as an actress.

“In an oral trial held today, it was determined that Prestofelippo must comply with a 200-meter contact perimeter with respect to the first lady for a year, must take a course on gender and respect for women from the Inadi (National Institute against Discrimination, Xenophobia and Racism) and pay the costs of the process, as Yañez’s defense had requested,” they reported in a statement from the Presidency.

With the presence of the first lady, the trial against “El Presto” was held in the Criminal and Misdemeanor Court 11 of the city of Buenos Aires, where the youtuber summoned his followers for the “pre-trial show” with a ” murga” at the door of the establishment “to celebrate this great circus”.

The prosecutor in charge of the Specialized Tax Unit for Computer Crimes and Contraventions of Buenos Aires, Daniela Dupuy, explained that the videos uploaded by the defendant to his social networks refer to Yañez in a derogatory manner and are accompanied by intimate and private images of the damaged.

According to the official letter, the first lady assured that these publications caused “very serious damage, gender violence, affecting the dignity of female victims, creating hostility, degradation, humiliation and an offensive environment in public spaces.”

The prosecutor argued that “it was carried out through digital means, through attacks on her intimate life and meddling in aspects of her private life, with total disregard for the real affectation that they can cause on the name and honor of the victim”.

Local media recalled that in September 2020, Prestofelippo had been arrested by order of the Córdoba federal justice in a case in which he was denounced for threatening the vice president, Cristina Fernández de Kirchner, through social networks, although later was dismissed.