Fernando Bécquer imprisoned by ruling of the Provincial Court of Havana.

January 13, 2023

The troubadour Fernando Bécquer, who had been sanctioned last October to a limitation of liberty without imprisonment, as a result of multiple sexual abuse complaints against him, must serve his sentence in prison, according to information provided by the Provincial Court of Havana.

The change in the sentence comes after Bécquer's publication last Monday on his Facebook page of two provocative song lyrics "still in compositional process," which triggered widespread rejection for their misogynistic character and offensive nature toward his victims.

As a result of this fact, "on January 10 the Popular Municipal Court of Centro Habana issued a resolution revoking the alternative sanction of 3 years and 4 months of limitation of liberty (supervised release), originally imposed by final sentence of that same judicial body, against citizen Fernando Daniel Becquer Cifuentes, for several crimes of indecent assault," states an official note.

"The new decision of the aforementioned court of justice, based on Article 33 section 1, subsection b) of Law No. 152 of 2022 –Penal Execution Law–, is due to the fact that citizen Becquer Cifuentes has recently incurred in serious acts that violate, in a blatant and notorious manner, the requirements of good conduct and respect for the norms of social coexistence, to which he was obligated in compliance with the aforementioned legal situation, just as had been previously warned," adds the communication from the Provincial Court of the Cuban capital.

New misogynistic statements by Fernando Bécquer provoke rejection

"By virtue of the new judicial resolution issued, hereinafter, said citizen will serve the imposed sanction in an internal regime in a penitentiary facility," concludes the note, dated this Thursday.

Fernando Bécquer had been found guilty of indecent assault by the Municipal Court of Centro Habana, after a trial that lasted around 12 hours and in which approximately 30 women testified. To this day, he insists on his innocence.

Several months after his sentence, this Monday Bécquer published the lyrics to "Feminist Guaracha" and "Anti metoo or Move with the Black Guy," full of obscenities against his victims; in particular, those who brought him before the courts and in general against those who exercised citizen pressure so that the crimes he committed between 1999 and 2021 would not go unpunished.

In response, entities such as the Federation of Cuban Women (FMC), the Cuban Institute of Music, as well as activists, artists and people in general publicly rejected the lyrics published by Bécquer and the controversy intensified around the sanction that was initially imposed on him, as well as the request to review the sentence and impose a harsher penalty.