The three-time world champion Formula One Nelson Piquet shall pay 5 million reais (953,050 dollars) in concept of moral damages by racist and homophobic comments against the Mercedes driver lewis hamiltonruled a Brazilian court.
In an interview in November 2021Piquet used a racial slur to refer to the seven times world champion, when commenting on the accident of hamilton in it UK Grand Prix with Max Verstappen.
hamilton asked that measures be taken to change “archaic mentalities” after footage of the interview surfaced on social media in June. piquet70 years old, asked excuse me to british and said that his comments had been mistranslated. The ex-pilot’s daughter, Kelly, is a partner of Verstappen.
In another clip that surfaced later, piquet used a racist and homophobic language to refer to Hamilton in a podcast interview when describing how the British driver lost the 2016 championship in view of Nico Rosberg.
hamiltonwho received honorary Brazilian citizenship in June, is F1’s only black driver.
The charges were brought by four human rights groups, including the National LGBT+ Alliance of Brazilwho wanted Piquet to pay 10 million reais for alleged moral damages.
In his decision, the judge Pedro Matos de Arrudo declared that the amount of compensation was given “in the sense that not only the remedial function of civil liability must be appreciated, but also (and perhaps mainly) the punitive function so that, as a society, we can one day free ourselves from the acts pernicious that racism and homophobia are”.
(With information Reuters)