Christiano Ronaldo is now facing the possibility of being tried for rape in the U.S. state of Nevada.
It follows the claim from former hotel hostess Kathryn Mayorga that the Portugal captain raped her in his £770-a-night penthouse room at the Hotel Palms Place in Las Vegas in 2009.
Photos show her partying with him at a nightclub .
The claims were first published by the German magazine, Der Spiegel Mailonline reports.
Claiming to have suffered years of mental torment and suicidal thoughts as a result, Miss Mayorga says Ronaldo’s lawyers purchased her silence in 2010 with a £288,000 out-of-court settlement, something she now regrets.
Relating how she encountered the footballer while drinking with friends in the hotel’s night club, Miss Mayorga says:
‘He just came up to me . . . grabbed my arm. And he was like: ‘‘You! Come with me!” I was like, are you joking?’
Paparazzi pictures show her talking to and dancing with the footballer and she says they exchanged phone numbers and she later got a text from him inviting her and a friend to a party in his suite.
She says he suggested they went for a swim but while she changed in one of the bathrooms, Ronaldo entered, exposed himself and begged her to touch him.
He finally relented but insisted on a kiss. But the kiss turned into more.
‘He starts to come on to me very strong,’ she says. ‘And he starts to do stuff to me and touch me and grab me. I pushed him away and kept saying No.’ Still, he persisted. ‘I turned away. He tried to take my underwear off. I turned away from him and curled up into a ball.
And that’s when he jumped on me.’ she says, claiming she was then raped, without a condom.
‘After he assaulted me, he wouldn’t let me leave again. He wouldn’t let me leave. And he was calling me ‘baby, baby’. He gave me this look, this guilty look. Almost like he felt bad.
I don’t remember but I’m pretty sure he said “sorry” or “are you hurt?” ‘And by this time, he’s . . . on his knees. He says ‘‘-nine per cent of me is a good guy, I just don’t know about the other one per cent.’’ ’
As part of the settlement, Ronaldo’s legal team reportedly insisted that Miss Mayorga be prohibited from mentioning the player even to her therapist..
Ronaldo’s lawyers have said they will sue the publication.
But the magazine is standing by its story.
Miss Mayorga, who until recently was working as a teacher in Las Vegas, says she has been encouraged to come forward by the more favourable climate created by the #MeToo movement, and the opportunity to discover if others have been abused by Ronaldo
Explaining why she accepted what is in effect hush money, Miss Mayorga explains: ‘
It’s a pretty famous guy. So, I’m terrified. I’m scared.’‘The reason why I signed the contract in the first place [was] because I didn’t want my name out there.’
But with the passing of time she is now ready to confront an episode that changed her character, resulting in heavy drinking and suicidal thoughts.
‘I wanted to teach him a lesson. I wanted him to deal with it, to have to face me,’ she says, adding that she accepted the money only to finance her treatment.
‘I’m not going to pay for my goddamn treatment. He raped me. He’s going to pay for my goddamn treatment!’
Emeh Achanga,the CEO of the Miss Petite Nigeria Brand is a lawyer turned blogger. She is very passionate about writing, with several publications and awards to her credit .She is currently working on publishing a collection of short stories which are basically a memoir about her exciting true experiences.
