By Alexis Oliva. In the early hours of Sunday, May 6, a player from the Córdoba Rugby Club entered a party at the LGBTQ+ bar Casa Warhol in the city of Córdoba with a group of men. After a series of threats and insults, he violently attacked one of the owners and insulted her partner. This was reported to the authorities by Jorgelina Sapp, the young woman who was assaulted. She stated that the rugby player, identified as Mauro Javier Oviedo (25), grabbed her by the hair and slammed her head against a column. She has already filed a complaint with the prosecutor's office. The cultural bar Casa Warhol is one of the nightlife venues favored by the LGBTQ+ community in the city of Córdoba. It has been operating for two years in an art deco mansion in the Alta Córdoba neighborhood. People from the LGBTQ+ community work there, and events such as the Amarte, film screenings, and talks on topics related to sexual diversity are held there. Last Saturday night, two girls were celebrating their birthdays there, and between them, there were about seventy guests. At 1:30 a.m., a group of men, “friends of friends of the guests,” tried to enter with alcoholic beverages. Sapp, one of the owners of the place, explained that they could stay but had to hand over the drinks, which would be returned to them upon leaving. After some protests, they accepted the deal and decided to stay. Oviedo stood out in the group: “because of his physique—almost two meters tall, burly, and athletic—because of his persistence, and because he addressed us with constant disrespect and threats,” Sapp told Presentes.

"Come on, you pull me out, since you're acting all tough!"

“It was obvious he was the leader of the group, the one everyone followed and celebrated everything he did,” the young woman added. “A gay coworker works at the bar, and Oviedo was making fun of him. We let it slide that time, but things got worse afterward.” The rugby player insisted on having his own drinks again, until Sapp and his partner, Santi Merlot, invited him to leave the bar with their friends. “Come on, you drag me out, since you’re acting all tough!” Oviedo reacted, alluding to Merlot’s transgender identity. At that point, his friends tried to reason with Oviedo, and the conflict moved from the patio to the front room of the bar. “Who do you think you are to drag me out? I’ll beat the crap out of you!” he yelled as the others held him down to take him away. With his free arm, he grabbed Jorgelina by the hair and slammed her head against a metal column: “I was stunned, I heard screams, his own friends were speechless. I'm 1.65 meters tall and weigh 72 kilos. What could I do?” While the young woman was being attended to, the aggressor and his group left. Jorgelina appreciates the solidarity of those who encouraged her to file a report: “Many people, even people I didn't know, told me they would testify.” As soon as she recovered, that same night she went to the Prosecutor's Office, District 3, Shift 6, in Córdoba. “At the prosecutor's office, they encouraged me to publicly shame him on social media, because 'he deserves it for being violent,' they said,” the complainant recalls, still surprised. At the time of writing, her Facebook post with the testimony, photos of the aggressor, and the criminal complaint had been shared 1748 times, had 801 reactions, and a hundred comments of solidarity. The club will investigate and promises sanctions Upon learning of the alleged assault, the Board of Directors of Córdoba Rugby Club yesterday expressed its “deepest concern” regarding statements “that implicate a member of this club in an unacceptable act, consistent with the definition of gender-based violence.” Club officials pledged to “summon those involved immediately, as the first step in an investigation to clarify the facts and gather evidence to proceed in accordance with the institution's disciplinary regulations and applicable legal frameworks.” “We thank the public for reporting any discriminatory actions against human dignity that any member of the institution may have committed. However, we also ask that these offenses not be attributed to an entire institution that has already begun the process of clarifying the facts and that, should they be confirmed, will not only condemn them but also sanction them accordingly, as is essential for those of us who desire a just, inclusive society that respects all diversity,” the statement concludes. “Misogyny triggered it” In her Facebook post, Jorgelina recounts that as soon as they entered, she could tell that “it wouldn't be an easy group because they violated the rules of conduct from the very beginning.” She explains that, basically, it's about respecting others and “not having homophobic, fatphobic, lesbophobic, transphobic attitudes.” The woman also ruled out that he was drunk: “He didn't seem to be. It was more like showing off his height, body, strength… I want to spread this and I'm afraid of the reprisals he might take, because I think it was triggered by misogyny. By not accepting that a woman could kick him out of the place.”