More businessmen accused by US justice
On the other hand, two former executives of US company Fox, a Spanish executive from the company Imagina, and Uruguayan sports company Full Play were charged with corruption, bank fraud, and money laundering in a New York court on Monday, as part of the FIFA Gate corruption scandal.
The accused are the two former Fox executives, Hernán López, 49, and Carlos Martínez, 51; Gerard Romy, a Spanish businessman from Imagina, 65, and the Uruguayan sports marketing company Full Play, based in Buenos Aires and owned by the fugitive Argentine defendants Hugo and Mariano Jinkis.
They are accused of paying million-dollar bribes to former officials of Conmebol, Concacaf, or Central American federations in exchange for lucrative broadcasting contracts for friendly matches, the Copa Libertadores, the Copa América, or qualification matches for the 2018 and 2022 World Cups.
The US government has charged a total of 45 individuals and several sports companies with over 90 crimes and with paying or accepting over 200 million dollars in bribes.
The federal court in Brooklyn, New York, updated the indictment against Ricardo Teixeira, former head of Brazilian football, and the late Paraguayan Nicolás Leoz, who received bribes in exchange for voting for Qatar 2022 in a FIFA executive committee held in December 2010.
The indictment also states that Trinidadian Jack Warner, former president of the North, Central American and Caribbean Confederation of Football (Concacaf), received bribes of 5 million dollars and that former Guatemalan football chief Rafael Salguero was promised one million in exchange for his votes in favor of Russia for the 2018 World Cup.
This information had already come to light during the trial of three defendants in 2017: former head of Brazilian football José María Marín, former head of Conmebol, Paraguayan Juan Ángel Napout, and former head of Peruvian football, Manuel Burga.
During that process, Argentine former sports businessman Alejandro Burzaco, a prosecution witness, stated that Teixeira, Leoz, and the late Argentine football chief Julio Grondona voted for Qatar in exchange for bribes of over one million dollars each.