'Psychological terrorism': Details of Fabiola Yáñez’s complaint against ex-president Alberto Fernández

Argentina’s former first lady Fabiola Yáñez testified on Tuesday before Federal Judge Julián Ercolini to set in motion a criminal complaint alleging gender-based violence by former president Alberto Fernández against her. 

An investigation into alleged domestic violence was shelved in early July because, as Ercolini detailed in a court filing, the plaintiff “did not wish to file a criminal report back then.”

The scandal erupted when text messages detailing the alleged violence cropped up in a separate fraud investigation. Clarín first reported the allegations.

Yáñez initially chose not to proceed with a complaint, but on Tuesday – just a couple of days after the first Clarín article appeared – she attended a supplementary hearing before Federal Criminal and Correctional Court No. 11 via Zoom videoconference from Madrid.

During the hearing, the former journalist and actress stated that she is suffering what she called “psychological terrorism,” as well as telephone harassment, “on a daily basis,” local news outlets said.

Fernández’s former partner asked the courts “to introduce protection measures in her favour” including “restraining orders against her alleged assailant, both physically and by electronic means,” reported the Noticias Argentinas news agency.

In addition to reports of physical violence” and psychological terrorism, Yáñez requested a change in the make-up of her security detail. She observed that one police officer assigned to her protection is a “trusted” ally of the former president and has requested the individual’s removal.

Fernández, who led Argentina from 2019 to 2023, stands accused of having beaten Yáñez during his time as head of state while they were living at the Olivos presidential residence.

Following the testimony from his former partner, he is also now under investigation for alleged “threatening contact.”

In response, Judge Ercolini has issued injunctions to protect the alleged victim. Fernández is now banned from coming within 500 metres of the plaintiff and has been ordered not to leave the country. 

In addition, the former head of state must “cease any disturbance or intimidation” (both direct and indirect) against his former partner, whether by analogue or digital means.

Ercolini also delegated the investigation to the federal prosecutor in the case, Carlos Rívolo.

The discovery of material that first sparked the investigation, which comes from the mobile phone analysed as part of a probe into alleged influence-peddling, was defined by Ercolini as “conversations and images that indicate the possible commission of the crime of minor injuries in a context of gender violence.”

Denial

Fernández denies the allegations against him.

On Tuesday, the former president clarified that he had “found out” about the complaint through the media and not the courts.

“What I am accused of never happened,” asserted the veteran Peronist leader.

“For the sake of the integrity of my children, my own and that of Fabiola herself, I will make no statements to the media, but will provide to the courts evidence and testimonies which will attest to what actually happened,” he said in a press release.

On Monday, criminal lawyer Juan Pablo Fioribello, who has previously worked for both Fernández and Yáñez, stated that the former president told him that “he had never in his life hit a woman.”

“He said: ‘I swear to God, I’ve never in my life hit a woman. I’ve had a thousand defects and I’ve made many mistakes, just like anyone else, more or less because of what I went through in politics, but one thing I am certain of, I’ve never become violent and I’ve never hit a woman,’” said Fioribello in a television interview on Monday.

– TIMES/PERFIL