FIFA leaders busted for corruption

[zoegirltx]

www.cnn.com/2015/05/27/football/fifa-corruption-charges-justice-department/index.html

:56 a.m. ET: The FIFA officials who have been arrested will not automatically be suspended from their positions, FIFA Director of Communications and Public Affairs Walter De Gregorio said Wednesday.



5:37 a.m. ET: No one at FIFA, including Sepp Blatter, knew that Swiss investigators would raid the soccer body's headquarters on Wednesday morning, De Gregorio said.



5:30 a.m. ET: The 2018 World Cup will be played in Russia and 2022 in Qatar, De Gregorio said. in response to a question about whether a Swiss corruption probe will affect the global sports contests.



5:26 a.m. ET: : "Of course" the FIFA Congress scheduled for Friday will take place as planned, De Gregorio said.



5:13 a.m. ET: Swiss authorities have opened a separate criminal investigation into FIFA's operations, this one pertaining to the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bids. FIFA awarded Russia and Qatar the World Cup in 2018 and 2022, respectively - decisions that hve come under heavy criticism and scrutiny.



Full story:



FIFA, the powerful and polarizing governing body for soccer, came under prosecutorial assault on two fronts Wednesday.



Acting on an indictment by the U.S. Justice Department, Swiss police arrested several top FIFA officials, including two vice presidents, during an overnight raid in Zurich on charges of corruption Wednesday.



The U.S. investigation targets alleged wrongdoing that spans 24 years. U.S. prosecutors issued arrest warrants for 14 people, on charges ranging from money laundering to fraud and racketeering. They include FIFA officials who took bribes totaling more than $150 million and in return provided "lucrative media and marketing rights" to soccer tournaments as kickbacks.



A few hours later, Swiss authorities said they have opened a separate criminal investigation into FIFA's operations, this one pertaining to the 2018 and 2022 World Cup bids, which went to Russia and Qatar respectively. Ten people are being questioned.



The criminal proceedings come as members of soccer's scandal-plagued governing body gathered for an election Friday that could give its leader Sepp Blatter a fifth term.



Blatter isn't among those being charged. But he was among those investigated, and officials say that part of the probe continues.



The election will go on as planned, FIFA said -- as will the games in Russia and Qatar.



"The timing may not obviously be the best, but FIFA welcomes the process," FIFA spokesman Walter De Gregorio told reporters. He acknowleged the investigations but didn't comment on them.



THE U.S. INVESTIGATION

The indictment, said U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch, "alleges corruption that is rampant, systemic, and deep-rooted both abroad and here in the United States.



"It spans at least two generations of soccer officials who, as alleged, have abused their positions of trust to acquire millions of dollars in bribes and kickbacks."



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EXPAND GALLERY

Why is the U.S. bringing down the hammer on FIFA?



One of the highest ranking official charged in the U.S. is Jeffrey Webb, a FIFA vice president and head of CONCACAF, the FIFA-affiliated governing body for North America and the Caribbean.



Other officials include: Jack Warner, former FIFA vice president and executive committee member; Eugenio Figueredo, FIFA vice president and executive committee member; and Nicolás Leoz, former FIFA executive committee member.



Several sports-marketing executives are also charged.



The Swiss Federal Office of Justice said the suspects accepted bribes and kickbacks totaling more than $150 million, from the early 1990s until now.



In return, they provided media, marketing and sponsorship rights to soccer matches in Latin America, the Swiss Office of Justice said.




The charges are a result of a three-year FBI investigation. In addition to the 14 who have been charged, four others have already pleaded guilty: four former FIFA officials and a sports marketing executive.



Lynch has scheduled a news conference for 10:30 a.m. in New York.



The reason why the United States brought charges against the suspects is because the plots were allegedly hatched on American soil.



"According to U.S. request, these crimes were agreed and prepared in the U.S., and payments were carried out via U.S. banks," the Swiss Office of Justice said.



THE SWISS INVESTIGATION

FIFA has been at the center of corruption investigations for years. But the organization has long dismissed allegations that top officials were on the take.



In December, FIFA's ethics committee said it was closing its investigation into alleged corruption in the 2018 and 2022 bidding process that awarded the World Cup to Russia and Qatar, respectively. Criticism immediately followed. There were allegations of corruption in the bidding process. Qatar's oppressive heat also drew ridicule as did its labor rights record.



FIFA said its investigation found no corruption and it has no reason to reopen the bidding process.



In 2011, the FIFA banned for life Mohamed bin Hammam, a Qatari member of its top governing body, for ethics violations.



On Wednesday, Swiss authorities said have opened a criminal investigation into FIFA's operations pertaining to the 2018 and 2022 bids.



The Office of the Attorney General of Switzerland said it is looking into criminal mismanagement and money laundering.



"The files seized today and the collected bank documents will serve criminal proceedings both in Switzerland and abroad," a statement from the attorney general's office said.



According to the statement, Swiss Federal Criminal Police will be questioning 10 people who took part in the voting when the 2018 and 2022 World Cups were awarded.



JURISDICTION ISSUES

Swiss officials say they are working closely with U.S. authorities, but the investigations are separate ones.



Part of the issue for U.S. authorities is establishing U.S. legal jurisdiction for alleged crimes that largely occurred outside the United States.



However, prosecutors believe the broad reach of U.S. tax and banking regulations aid their ability to bring the charges.



In addition, U.S. authorities claim jurisdiction because the American television market, and billions paid by U.S. networks, is the largest for the World Cup.



"Today's announcement should send a message that enough is enough," said Acting U.S. Attorney Currie. "After decades of what the indictment alleges to be brazen corruption, organized international soccer needs a new start.



"Let me be clear: this indictment is not the final chapter in our investigation."



True to their words, authorities were executing a search warrant at the CONCACAF headquarters in Miami on Wednesday morning.

[zoegirltx]

i'm still doubtful qatar will happen....this should be interesting!

[summer]

There has been talk of corruption for years. I'm surprised Sepp Blatter wasn't included. I'm glad someone is finally taking a look into it.

[IIOY]

OMG we are now going to have sponsored posts in threads? Seriously, TapaTalk?

[Cicero]

There are a few people in the Federal Assembly who have made taking FIFA on their mission in the past couple of years, largely because it is a nonprofit. Up until now I thought it was a small contingent and mostly talk. I guess that isn't the car.

[Deleted]

May 27, 2015 5:31:07 GMT -5 summer said:

There has been talk of corruption for years. I'm surprised Sepp Blatter wasn't included. I'm glad someone is finally taking a look into it.

Yeah this does not surprise me one bit.

[Cicero]

May 27, 2015 7:10:48 GMT -5 @wandering said:

May 27, 2015 5:31:07 GMT -5 summer said:

There has been talk of corruption for years. I'm surprised Sepp Blatter wasn't included. I'm glad someone is finally taking a look into it.

Yeah this does not surprise me one bit.

TBH I'm surprised the Swiss are actually investigating.

[sunshine608]

May 27, 2015 5:29:26 GMT -5 zoegirltx said:

i'm still doubtful qatar will happen....this should be interesting!

I'm curious about how this will shake out for them as well. 

[Cicero]

May 27, 2015 7:55:33 GMT -5 mryrcn said:

FIFA has been corrupt for a long time. Cicero did you hear that the president of the company in control of the Railhawks was indicted as well? This has a global and very local impact.

Why do they keep fucking with the beautiful game? Between this and the damn fake injuries!!!!

I did. That was part of the U.S. investigation, right? It's seeming like the people arrested were done so to extradict back to the U.S. and the information seized in a seperate raid was for the Swiss investigation into 2018 and 2022.

[Cicero]

May 27, 2015 8:05:58 GMT -5 mryrcn said:

May 27, 2015 8:04:56 GMT -5 Cicero said:

I did. That was part of the U.S. investigation, right? It's seeming like the people arrested were done so to extradict back to the U.S. and the information seized in a seperate raid was for the Swiss investigation into 2018 and 2022, right?

That is my understanding.  What a damn mess.  Sep needs to be removed.  

Hes not going to be. He has bought his position and knows how to hold it. The arrests are interesting to me because Sepp is refusing to come to the U.S. while the FBI investigation is ongoing. This would appear to say he's fair game anyway.

[stephreloaded]

The corruption surprises absolutely no one but I just never thought something was going to be done about it.

I highly doubt Qatar will happen.

[zoegirltx]

May 27, 2015 8:42:27 GMT -5 stephreloaded said:

The corruption surprises absolutely no one but I just never thought something was going to be done about it.

I highly doubt Qatar will happen.

what are the options???  How quickly could a new FIFA move to pick an alternate location?

[Deleted]

May 27, 2015 9:49:28 GMT -5 zoegirltx said:

May 27, 2015 8:42:27 GMT -5 stephreloaded said:

The corruption surprises absolutely no one but I just never thought something was going to be done about it.

I highly doubt Qatar will happen.

what are the options???  How quickly could a new FIFA move to pick an alternate location?

The US, Germany or the UK could host on pretty short notice. They'd just need to make the call. 

[laurenpetro]

May 27, 2015 9:49:28 GMT -5 zoegirltx said:

May 27, 2015 8:42:27 GMT -5 stephreloaded said:

The corruption surprises absolutely no one but I just never thought something was going to be done about it.

I highly doubt Qatar will happen.

what are the options???  How quickly could a new FIFA move to pick an alternate location?

The women's World Cup was moved to the U.S. last minute a while ago. Frankly, I'd bet we'll get it. We were "second" after Qatar anyway and we have the facilities. And it's not as hot as the surface of the sun.

[Cicero]

May 27, 2015 9:53:54 GMT -5 laurenpetro said:

May 27, 2015 9:49:28 GMT -5 zoegirltx said:

what are the options???  How quickly could a new FIFA move to pick an alternate location?

The women's World Cup was moved to the U.S. last minute a while ago. Frankly, I'd bet we'll get it. We were "second" after Qatar anyway and we have the facilities. And it's not as hot as the surface of the sun.

And we haven't denied a whole bunch of Nepalese slave laborers the ability to go home to bury their dead relatives.

[laurenpetro]

May 27, 2015 9:58:57 GMT -5 Cicero said:

May 27, 2015 9:53:54 GMT -5 laurenpetro said:

The women's World Cup was moved to the U.S. last minute a while ago. Frankly, I'd bet we'll get it. We were "second" after Qatar anyway and we have the facilities. And it's not as hot as the surface of the sun.

And we haven't denied a whole bunch of Nepalese slave laborer the ability to go home to bury their dead relatives.

i wonder how this is going to play out for the workers.  some of those guys are midway through their 5 year servitude.  are they going to get kicked out or moved to go build some other shithole palace?    

[iammalcolmx]

May 27, 2015 9:58:57 GMT -5 Cicero said:

May 27, 2015 9:53:54 GMT -5 laurenpetro said:

The women's World Cup was moved to the U.S. last minute a while ago. Frankly, I'd bet we'll get it. We were "second" after Qatar anyway and we have the facilities. And it's not as hot as the surface of the sun.

And we haven't denied a whole bunch of Nepalese slave laborer the ability to go home to bury their dead relatives.

My lord

[zoegirltx]

Soccer officials charged in a corruption investigation "engaged in bribery to decide who would televise games, where the games would be held and who would run the organization overseeing organized soccer worldwide," U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch said.

Lynch said FIFA executives and others used bribes to influence where the 2010 World Cup would be held; that tournament was held in South Africa. She also alleged $110 million in bribes related to the Copa America tournament to be held in the United States in 2016.

"The next step in the process is extradition," she said.
=========
www.cnn.com/2015/05/27/football/fifa-corruption-charges-justice-department/index.html

[summer]

I was just watching the Russian anti-corruption officer speak on the issue this now. If Russia goes to the U.S., U.K. or Germany, they are going to be pissed. He basically said it was an American witch-hunt.

[Cicero]

May 27, 2015 15:19:50 GMT -5 summer said:

I was just watching the Russian anti-corruption officer speak on the issue this now. If Russia goes to the U.S., U.K. or Germany, they are going to be pissed. He basically said it was an American witch-hunt.

The only government investigating the 2018 voting (or for that matter 2022) is Switzerland. The FBI investigation is centered around CONCACAF and broadcast issues.

[summer]

May 27, 2015 15:27:32 GMT -5 Cicero said:

May 27, 2015 15:19:50 GMT -5 summer said:

I was just watching the Russian anti-corruption officer speak on the issue this now. If Russia goes to the U.S., U.K. or Germany, they are going to be pissed. He basically said it was an American witch-hunt.

The only government investigating the 2018 voting (or for that matter 2022) is Switzerland. The FBI investigation is centered around CONCACAF and broadcast issues.

You go tell him that! LOL It is definitely all America's fault as far as he was concerned in that interview. We are apparently imposing our politics on the rest of the world. The more you know.

[zoegirltx]

or was it just b/c all the people were gather in one location & in a place with extradition?

how will the 2 conflicting investigations work? will they extradite them to the US or can they go home & wait for a trial? Or refuse to come to the US?

[Cicero]

May 27, 2015 16:09:57 GMT -5 @littlemoxie said:

May 27, 2015 15:27:32 GMT -5 Cicero said:

The only government investigating the 2018 voting (or for that matter 2022) is Switzerland. The FBI investigation is centered around CONCACAF and broadcast issues.

The timing seems suspect, though.  I can definitely see why the Swiss authorities would feel emboldened or like "now's the time" after the U.S. did this.  

Do we really believe Switzerland decided to do this all on its own?  If so, why wait until now?

There are a few people in the Federal Assembly who have been pushing towards this since FIFA refused to report its own findings on the issue. They've been pushing to strip FIFA of its non-profit status so that they'd be forced to report everything a corp. would have to under Swiss law--and I'm sure the fact that this would take away their tax exempt status plays a part as well.

As for the timing--they're voting to reelect Blatter president on Friday. So all the key players, everyone with voting power, and everyone they'd be interested in talking to is all in the same place for the First and last time in years.

[Cicero]

May 27, 2015 16:14:08 GMT -5 zoegirltx said:

or was it just b/c all the people were gather in one location & in a place with extradition?

how will the 2 conflicting investigations work? will they extradite them to the US or can they go home & wait for a trial? Or refuse to come to the US?

The US had asked CH to extradict.

[secretlyevil]

I will be interested to see if these charges actually stick.

[zoegirltx]

talkingpointsmemo.com/this-chart/chart-fifa-bribery-scheme

Federal prosecutors alleged in an indictment unsealed Wednesday that top FIFA officials over the past two decades have turned soccer's international governing body into a racketeering enterprise.



This chart released by prosecutors showed how top officials with CONCACAF and CONMEBOL, the organizations under the FIFA umbrella that govern soccer in North and Central America and the Caribbean and South America, respectively, allegedly traded official support for bribes and kickbacks from sports marketing companies.



In return, those sports marketing companies secured the rights to CONCACAF and CONMEBOL's soccer tournaments, which they then could sell to broadcasters and corporate sponsors at a premium price.

[zoegirltx]

fivethirtyeight.com/features/how-fifas-structure-lends-itself-to-corruption/ 

The U.S. Justice Department says the indictments it handed down Wednesday against soccer officials and sports-marketing executives are just the beginning of its efforts to root out corruption in the sport. A comprehensive investigation might find that the sport’s structure itself makes soccer vulnerable to corruption. FIFA disproportionately favors its smaller states, leaving the most corruptible members with outsize control over the organization.



FIFA has 209 member-nations, and each one’s soccer association is equally powerful in the sport’s governing body. Every member, from China (population: 1.36 billion) to tiny Montserrat (population: 5,215), gets one vote in the FIFA Congress. That means each one gets to cast a vote in the FIFA presidential election scheduled for this Friday in Zurich. And each one — from Brazil (five men’s World Cup wins, one of the world’s best women’s teams) to, well, let’s stick to Montserrat (men’s team never ranked higher than No. 165, women’s team unranked) — will get equal say in choosing hosts of future World Cups.



That wasn’t always the case. In 2010, the FIFA executive committee voted to select which countries would host the 2018 and 2022 men’s World Cup tournaments. That meant just 22 people participated in a controversial balloting that, astonishingly, awarded the 2022 tournament to Qatar, a nation with scant soccer history that doesn’t have soccer-suitable summer weather, bans same-sex sexual activity and has a poor record of worker safety and rights. (On Wednesday, Switzerland’s attorney general’s office said it had opened criminal proceedings around the selection of the 2018 and 2022 World Cup hosts.)



In 2011, FIFA changed its voting rules. In future host selections, each member-association will get one vote. Multiplying the number of voters by nearly 10 should diminish the impact of any one corrupt vote.



The “one member, one vote” principle could, in theory, be a way for FIFA to protect its smallest members, much as the creators of the U.S. Senate intended in giving the smallest state the same number of senators as the biggest one. “Please note that the ‘one member one vote’ system was established since the foundation of FIFA and it relates to a democratic principle,” a FIFA spokesperson said by email in response to my inquiry.



In practice, this is one unequal form of democracy. While California has 66 times the population of the smallest U.S. states, there are more than 250,000 times the number of people living in China as in Montserrat.



This isn’t only a theoretical problem of inequity. Soccer power in smaller nations concentrates itself in fewer officials and stakeholders. That makes the nations’ votes — votes that occur in secret FIFA ballots — more vulnerable to corruption from bribery. In the indictments Wednesday, the Justice Department alleged, among other charges, that voters took bribes in both the selection of the 2010 men’s World Cup and the 2011 FIFA presidential election. Among those indicted was Jeffrey Webb, president of the football association of the Cayman Islands (population: 58,435).



But bribes aren’t the only thing that might influence those smaller nations. It’s aboveboard money, too. A small amount of funding from FIFA will go much further in a tiny island territory than in a superpower.



“If the organization had a stronger reputation for integrity, this might not matter so much,” Robin Hodess, group director of advocacy and research for the anti-corruption group Transparency International, said about FIFA’s voting structure. “This is a difficult issue to solve — you want democratic organizations, but you don’t want that to be abused,” Hodess said.



It didn’t help when FIFA’s president, Sepp Blatter, announced higher World Cup bonuses for member-associations last year at the same time that he was signaling his intention to seek re-election, reneging on an earlier promise not to run again. “The link between who holds the purse strings and who votes was very blatant,” Hodess said.



On FIFA’s website, the organization posts specific funding information, by member, for two programs: Goal, for projects such as building new fields or association headquarters, and the Financial Assistance Program (FAP), which funds a wide range of projects. My colleague Paul Schreiber helped me pull the data for every active Goal project and for FAP payments from 2010 to 2014. I then cross-referenced the funding numbers with population and per-capita GDP figures to see whether bigger countries, or the poorer ones that we’d expect to need more funding, would get more help from FIFA.1



Whether a member state is big or small doesn’t seem to matter — FIFA spending isn’t tied to the number of people covered by the association. There was no correlation between a member’s population2 and the budget of active Goal projects. And there was a slight negative correlation between FAP spending and population — partly because the populous countries of China and Nigeria got less than average.3 Take, for example, the combined budget for the active Goal projects in Montserrat ($1.8 million)4 and compare it with that of projects in China ($3 million). Or the amount of FAP funds that the West Indies island received, $2.05 million, versus the amount China received, $800,000.



That’s not to say that members should necessarily get funds in proportion to their populations. The size of a country’s economy also affects its needs. But that doesn’t appear to enter into FIFA’s calculations, either. There is essentially no correlation between GDP per capita and Goal or FAP funding per capita.5



Funding is almost as evenly spread among FIFA members as voting power is. More than 90 percent of associations received between $1.8 million and $2.1 million from FAP between 2010 and 2014. Goal spending isn’t quite as flat, but 71 percent of members’ active projects have total budgets between $1 million and $3 million.



These aren’t bribes, and this isn’t traditional corruption: They’re totally legal, publicly disclosed funding projects. It’s just that a lot of them are in tiny countries with impotent soccer federations that spend it in dubious ways enriching their officials.



“It’s pure pork-­barrel politics,” Bloomberg wrote in an investigation of FIFA’s finances last month. Bloomberg’s article ends by describing Blatter and other FIFA presidential candidates6 as they made their pitch to member-nations. Each one stressed expanding payments to member-associations — by the same amount to each member.

[Cicero]

May 27, 2015 16:43:10 GMT -5 @littlemoxie said:

May 27, 2015 16:20:04 GMT -5 Cicero said:

There are a few people in the Federal Assembly who have been pushing towards this since FIFA refused to report its own findings on the issue. They've been pushing to strip FIFA of its non-profit status so that they'd be forced to report everything a corp. would have to under Swiss law--and I'm sure the fact that this would take away their tax exempt status plays a part as well.

As for the timing--they're voting to reelect Blatter president on Friday. So all the key players, everyone with voting power, and everyone they'd be interested in talking to is all in the same place for the First and last time in years.

Hmmm... I'm just so shocked the Swiss are doing anything that I'm having problems accepting that this was totally independent.  Perhaps in turning things over to the Americans they saw something they could no longer ignore?  The way it reads to me, the Swiss investigation started towards the end of the American one.

I'm a co-conspiracy theorist with the Russians on this.

I would notbe at all surprised to learn that I the course of their investigations the FBI came across proof of something over which they did not have jurisdiction and handed it over. I don't think that equates to the US pulling all of the strings or fabricating things as part of a huge witch hunt. To be pedectly frank, the U.S. could not give two fucks about the 2018 World Cup.

[ttt]

LOL

www.theonion.com/article/fifa-frantically-announces-2015-summer-world-cup-u-50525