Thousands call for gay man jailed for ‘sexually assaulting a woman’ to be freed

Thousands of people are calling for a gay man accused of sexually assaulting a woman to be freed from prison.

Joan Cardona, from Barcelona, has been jailed for three years after being found guilty of fondling a woman over the top of her clothes outside her home in November 2012.

Despite his insistence that he’s a gay man and has no sexual attraction towards the opposite sex, the 28-year-old was jailed after his legal battle came to an end earlier this month.

The woman, who was assaulted by a man driving a motorcycle and wearing a helmet and leather jacket, spotted Joan at a supermarket ten days later and called the police.

She claimed he was the man who had assaulted her, and she later picked him out of a police line-up, according to GSN.

Despite this, Joan has insisted he is a gay man, and claims to have been having dinner with his brother and roommate at the time of the alleged attack.

He doesn’t own a motorbike, and a transcript of his Facebook conversations show that he was messaging his boyfriend at the time he’s claimed to have assaulted the woman.

During the trial, the judge said that the victim had claimed that her attacker was 6ft tall, but Joan is just 5ft 7.

The Department of Traffic Headquarters also confirmed that neither Joan, or any of his immediate friends, own a motorbike or have a licence to drive one.

Following his sentencing, a social media campaign has been started in a bid to free him. So far, nearly 10,000 people have signed a petition urging for his case to be re-opened.

The campaigners state: “We ask the Constitutional Court to take a closer look at this case and to value the evidence and testimony provided in the trial.

“There was one victim in this case when it started, but now our judicial system has created two.”