The National Police arrested four people Tuesday for the placement of a banner against Real Madrid and a dummy hanging from a bridge near the sports city of the white club with the shirt of Brazilian footballer Vinicius Jr. in January, before the Copa del Rey derby against Atletico Madrid.
Those arrested are four men aged between 19 and 24, three of them active members of the ultra group Frente Atletico, and all of them are accused of a hate crime, as reported by the National Police.
LaLiga had filed a complaint with the 28th Court of Instruction of Madrid, which was accompanied by a report from its integrity and security department, which already pointed to the responsibility of a specific individual.
The inflatable dummy wearing the Real Madrid footballer’s shirt appeared hanging from a bridge on the morning of January 26th, the date on which the Madrid derby of the quarter-finals of the Copa del Rey was played.
Next to the dummy was displayed a sixteen-meter-long banner reading “Madrid hates Real”.
The investigation, carried out by the Provincial Information Brigade, began that same day with the collection of traces in the place where the banner was placed, which allowed the agents to identify four men as the alleged perpetrators of the acts.
Three of them are part of the Frente Atletico ultra group of the Colchonero team and had already been identified by the police in the framework of devices deployed in matches declared high risk.
Following their identification, the four men were arrested on Tuesday morning in an operation coordinated by the 38th Court of Instruction of Madrid and the Cyber Hate Section of the Provincial Prosecutor’s Office.
The arrests have taken place after the racist insults suffered by Vinicius Jr. last Sunday at the Valencian stadium of Mestalla.