A Moroccan migrant accused of sexually assaulting an unconscious woman on a street in Spain has been released and told to stay 200 meters away from the victim. Police allegedly found him lying on top of the victim with her pants down, touching her genitals.
The Lleida Court of First Instance ordered the suspect’s release while imposing precautionary measures, including a protection order for the victim. The accused has been banned from approaching within 200 meters of the woman or communicating with her by any means.
According to Segre, the victim told the court that she was afraid of the suspect and was also suffering from physical discomfort following the alleged attack, yet the court still ordered his initial release rather than keeping him in pre-trial detention.
The incident took place at around 4:30 a.m. on Ramon Llull Street in the Catalan city of Lleida. As reported by La Bandera, a local resident spotted a woman around 40 years old lying on the sidewalk with a man on top of her and alerted police, initially suspecting that she may have been the victim of a robbery.
When officers arrived, they found the man on top of the woman, who was unconscious. Upon closer inspection, they saw that the woman’s pants had been pulled down.
The suspect was arrested at the scene on suspicion of sexual assault.
Emergency medical workers treated the woman at the scene after she partially regained consciousness. She was then transferred to Arnau de Vilanova Hospital for a medical examination.
The Moroccan national claimed that the encounter was consensual. Investigators are now examining the exact circumstances of the alleged assault, including the woman’s condition at the time and whether she was capable of giving consent.
The investigation is ongoing.
Spain has recorded a sharp rise in reported sexual crimes over the past decade. Eurostat data published last month showed that Spain registered 5,222 reported rapes in 2024, compared with 1,239 in 2014. That represents a 322 percent increase over the decade, far above the EU-wide average increase of 150 percent.
The rise has also been visible in more recent figures. Penetrative rape cases in Spain increased by 143 percent in just five years, rising from 2,143 in 2019 to 5,206 in 2024
Eurostat does not break down the data by the nationality or background of offenders. However, separate research points to the overrepresentation of foreigners in Spain’s prison population and in several serious crime categories. A CEU-CEFAS Demographic Observatory report titled “Demography of Crime in Spain” found that foreigners make up 31 percent of Spain’s prison population, more than double their share of the general population among those aged 20 to 69.
In Catalonia alone, 91 percent of those convicted of rape are foreigners, while immigrants make up just 17 percent of the total population of that region.
The Eurostat report also found significant overrepresentation among North Africans and Latin Americans, including in serious offenses such as rape and homicide. Previous regional data has shown similar patterns in parts of Spain, including the Basque region, where foreigners have been heavily overrepresented in sexual assault statistics.
