The Disappearing Trial Case study: Flavia Totoro Flavia Totoro was arrested at a public protest organised in Madrid in 2011 after she was involved in an altercation with police officers. Eight more demonstrators were arrested in the aftermath of the protest. After spending forty five hours in detention, Flavia was charged with an offence of assaulting a police officer for which the prosecution sought a penalty of a year and a half imprisonment. She also found that despite the fact that she did not know or have any connection with the other protesters, she and all the other detainees were to be heard as co-accused in one single judicial proceeding. In 2016, before the start of her trial, the prosecutor offered Flavia a settlement whereby her penalty would be reduced to a monetary fine if she was to plead guilty for the alleged offences. Given the refusal of the prosecution to separate the proceedings for each one of the accused, she was faced with the dilemma of either taking the plea deal and have her penalty and those of her co-accused (who were facing much higher penalties) reduced to monetary fines or refusing to plead guilty and continue with the proceedings to demonstrate her innocence (which she maintains to date). Flavia was told that “she either plead guilty or all the others accused would be at risk of being sentenced to prison”. Despite having enough evidence to prove her own innocence in trial, she felt coerced to accept her guilt in order to protect her fellow demonstrators from being found guilty at trial and put in prison. As a result, all the accused, including herself, had their prospective penalties reduced to monetary fines. Flavia maintains that she was arbitrarily detained and that she was forced to admit to acts that she had not committed and to take the guilty plea despite being innocent, all in order to avoid causing harm to the co-accused. Flavia just could not bear the burden of putting her fellow demonstrators at risk of imprisonment. Taking the plea deal was also an opportunity to put an end to the judicial proceedings that had been going on for over five years. 35.