They order the arrest of renowned accordion player Rafael Ricardo

Rafael Guillermo Ricardo Barrios is one of the Colombian musicians who is part of the history of vallenato in the country, being a renowned accordion player and actor; however, for several months he has been facing legal problems that, in recent hours, ended with an arrest warrant against him.

The arrest warrant was issued by a judge in Bogotá, after considering that the vallenatero had failed to comply with a previous ruling of the Constitutional Court that had ordered him to publicly retract the statements he had made against the vice-president of the Society of Authors and Composers (SAYCO), Rafael Manjarrez. As Ricardo did not comply with this order, the Bogotá judge ordered two days' arrest of the musician.

In addition to the two-day arrest, the First Civil Municipal Court of Bogotá also imposed a fine of three statutory minimum monthly wages ($3,000,000) for contempt, which he must cancel within the next five days to the Superior Council of the Judiciary.

The case began in 2019, when Rafael Ricardo was denounced of apparent insult and slander against Rafael Enrique Manjarrez Mendoza, renowned composer and vice president of Sayco. At that time, the Constitutional Court ruled in favor of Manjarrez, noting that in order to guarantee his right to honor and good name, the accordion player must publicly rectract from his statements.

However, the judge explained that “despite a reasonable period of time elapsed since the procession and execution of the order issued by the Constitutional Court, the incident Rafael Guillermo Ricardo Barrios violates the rights to the good name and honor of Rafael Enrique Manjarrez Mendoza, however, although it is true , complied with the withdrawal of several messages referring to the shareholder, it is no less true that the enforcement of the guardianship judgment was partial, since despite having deleted several messages referring to the shareholder published on its social networks of Facebook and Google LLC (YouTube) under the terms of the Unification judgment 420 of 2019 delivered by the Constitutional Court, the truth is that there is disobedience to the warning made by the High Court in the fifth paragraph of the judgment (...) that in the future it refrain from engaging in conduct similar to those described.”

Ricardo has become one of the musicians who most publicly attacks the Society of Authors and Composers and, in the same way, in his social networks over the years he has referred to Manjarrez as “bandit, rogue, scoundrel, corrupt”, as the accordionist himself acknowledged El Heraldo in 2019, when started the legal mess. For his part, the vice president of Sayco told the same media outlet that for several years he has been the victim of “systematic slander and insult” by the accordion player.

As Manjarrez explained in 2019, when he filed tutelage against the accordion player to recover his good name, the whole conflict began when Sayco “received a request from Rafael Ricardo, requesting an immeasurable amount ($200 million)” for the musical successes in which he participates as an accordion player. And it was precisely because of the latter that Manjarrez declined the musician's request, considering that “the gentleman is a performer of the accordion, it is not the same if the instance had been carried out by a composer and partner”.

He added to justice that, since then, “I became an object of hatred on the part of Ricardo, although it has been shown that his recording works do not include any work as an author”.

For his part, Rafael Ricardo explained to the regional media that his claim to Sayco “is due to the corruption that exists in Sayco. That is undoubted and I have the proof (...). And it's true that I'm fighting my money, because they're stealing it from me and I've been in Sayco for 40 years.” He added that, in fact, “I said that he is a bandit, rogue, scoundrel, corrupt. Suddenly at that, mea culpa, I have abused the word a little.”

Despite the court's orders for Ricardo to retract and withdraw from the networks his public statements against Manjarrez, he has not done so and has previously publicly declared that “if they are going to put me in jail, they will put me in jail now. If they are going to kill me, let them kill me now.”

KEEP READING: