Why Dani Alves cannot afford €1m bail price in spite of fortune in excess of €50m

Former Brazilian footballer Dani Alves continues to remain in custody at the time of writing, despite being granted a €1m bail last week, as his rape conviction awaits the appeal process.

Alves is seemingly unable to pay the fee himself, with his family reportedly looking at a loan in order to get him out of prison after 14 months in jail now. The initial €150k damages fee paid to the victim was covered by Neymar Junior and his family, but they declined to pay his bail fee, following the conviction.

This is all despite Alves having amassed a fortune in excess of €50m over a career that had spanned over two decades. MD detail that the reason Alves cannot access that money is due to the fact that most of it is in Brazil, and as he has not paid the child maintenance he is due to his ex-wife and two children Dinorah Santana, his accounts in Brazil have been frozen, and he is unable to withdraw money.

That is where the majority of his fortune lies, while he has two bank accounts in Spain, one of which is empty. The other contains €50k, but is under a legal embargo, and is clearly insufficient. Hence currently the Alves family is searching for a line of credit to activate the bail.

Alves has been convicted of rape and sentenced to four and a half years in prison, in addition to the damages paid, as well as given a restraining order and probation on fulfilment of his sentence. The defence have appealed looking for an innocent verdict, while the prosecution is looking to double his sentence, and the victim is seeking the maximum 12-year term.