Media Executives and Sports Marketing Company Indicted in FIFA Case
April 7, 2020
Former Executives from U.S. Broadcasting Company 21st Century Fox and Spanish Sports Media Company Imagina Media Audiovisual SL, along with Argentina-Based Sports Marketing Company Full Play Group S.A., Charged with Bribing Soccer Officials
A 53-count third-superseding indictment (the “Indictment”) was unsealed in federal court in Brooklyn charging sports marketing executives Hernan Lopez and Carlos Martinez, formerly of 21st Century Fox, Inc. (“Fox”); Gerard Romy, former co-CEO of Spanish media company Imagina Media Audiovisual SL (“Imagina”); and Uruguayan sports marketing company Full Play Group S.A. (“Full Play”) (collectively, the “New Defendants”) with wire fraud, money laundering and related offenses – including, as to Romy and Full Play, racketeering conspiracy – in connection with the government’s long-running investigation and prosecution of corruption in organized soccer. The Indictment, returned under seal by a federal grand jury on March 18, 2020, includes additional charges against certain defendants located overseas who were previously indicted and have yet to be extradited to the United States.
pril 9, 2020, before United States District Judge Pamela K. Chen in Brooklyn.
Richard P. Donoghue, United States Attorney for the Eastern District of New York, William F. Sweeney, Jr., Assistant Director-in-Charge, Federal Bureau of Investigation, New York Field Office (FBI), and Ryan L. Korner, Special Agent-in-Charge, Internal Revenue Service Criminal Investigation, Los Angeles Field Office (IRS-CI), announced the charges.
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“The charges unsealed today reflect this Office’s ongoing commitment to rooting out corruption at the highest levels of international soccer and at the businesses engaged in promoting and broadcasting the sport,” stated United States Attorney Donoghue. The profiteering and bribery in international soccer have been deep-seated and commonly known practices for decades. Consistent with previous indictments returned in the case, the Indictment alleges that over a period of more than two decades, the defendants and their co-conspirators corrupted the enterprise by engaging in various criminal activities, including fraud, bribery and money laundering.
As set forth in the Indictment, the New Defendants used their positions in the world of international soccer to engage in schemes involving the solicitation, offer, acceptance, payment and receipt of bribes and kickbacks, principally to obtain lucrative broadcast rights to various international soccer tournaments and events.
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