Ronaldo paid $375,000 to silence his rape victim

A report claims that Real Madrid football star Cristiano Ronaldo paid $375,000 in hush money to a woman who accused him of raping her in Las Vegas some eight years ago.

German weekly news magazine Der Spiegel said in a Friday report that it had obtained documents, through Football Leaks, that the world-known Portuguese football player, now 32, agreed to give the large sum of money to the unnamed woman after she alleged that Ronaldo raped her at a luxury hotel in Las Vegas in June 2009, when she was in her 20s.

The report, citing the secured documents, added that the woman and Ronaldo, through his lawyer Carlos Osório de Castro, had reached the out-of-court settlement on January 12, 2010 in front of a Nevada mediator.

The magazine further said that de Castro declined to comment on the controversial case but added that it was contacted by a second German lawyer, Johannes Keiler, who dismissed the claims against his client and urged the weekly to drop the report.

“The accusations implied by your questions are to be rejected in the strongest possible terms,” he said, warning that his client would “act against every untrue claim and the injury of his personal rights.”

Back in October 2005, Ronaldo, then a Manchester United winger, made news after a woman claimed he had sexually assaulted her in a penthouse suite in London’s Sanderson Hotel earlier that month.

Ronaldo categorically rejected the charges then and a month later Scotland Yard officially announced that the charges had to be dropped due to inadequate evidence.