RIO DE JANEIRO A Rio de Janeiro court on Friday accepted prosecutors’ charges against the man who until recently was Europe’s top Olympic official and nine others in an illegal ticket-scalping ring picked up by police at the Games in August.
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A number of others are also being prosecuted but all have left Brazil.
The 10 defendants – including Mallon and Hickey – are charged with criminal organisation, ticket touting, ambush marketing, larceny, money laundering, and tax evasion.
The judge ordered that the passports of Hickey and Mallon be retained, and both be impeded from leaving Brazil, for the foreseeable future.
They are now set to stand trial in Rio.
Should they violate the terms of house arrest, Hickey and Mallon could return to jail, the court warned.
Brazilian police said on Thursday they want to question International Olympic Committee head Thomas Bach as a witness in investigations of a suspected ticket scam by officials during last month’s Games.
Paper trail One email from THG owner Marcus Evans summed up the details of a meeting between THG and the organising committee of the next major Olympic event – the PyeongChang Winter Olympics to be held in South Korea in 2018 – for which the OCI already had an agreement with THG to act as its authorised ticket vendor.
Police accused Hickey, 71, of operating the ticket-scalping operation with PRO10 to funnel tickets for the Rio Games through THG Sports to raise 10 million reais ($3 million) after jacking up prices.
“We can use this with the media if/when the PyC relationship becomes public, which I fear will be at any time”.
Mr Hickey, was the most senior Olympic official in Ireland before his dramatic arrest in a Rio hotel room on 17 August.
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It is not clear if the letter was sent.
