The night before, he was talking about plans to clean up world soccer.
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The newly indicted defendants include Honduran Alfredo Hawit, the president of the Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football, or Concacaf; and Paraguayan Juan Angel Napout, the president of the South American Football Confederation, or Conmebol, both of whom were arrested Thursday in Zurich at the request of the United States.
The US Department of Justice requested the arrests as part of its ongoing investigation into corruption in football’s world governing body.
A current member of the Audit and Compliance Committee, the organisation in charge of financial accounting and transparency within Federation Internationale de Football Association, is also among those charged. Chavez was jailed in July on charges arising from a separate investigation – that he diverted funds from a charity soccer match. The U.S. government agency was also responsible for the first set of arrests.
“I think what has happened today is very serious because obviously Hawit took over when Jeffrey Webb was arrested in Zurich, and obviously we would have felt that he was above board and everything should be cool”.
Valdez said he will travel to CONMEBOL’s headquarters in Asuncion, Paraguay, in the next few days and the institution’s few remaining officials will discuss its future.
The charges allege that illegal payments have been made around the sale of broadcasting rights for tournaments into the next decade.
She said: “The Department of Justice is committed to ending the rampant corruption we have alleged amidst the leadership of global soccer”. Their extradition is being sought.
FIFA Ethics Committee statement listed the United States racketeering, conspiracy and corruption charges as the cause of the suspension. Several sports marketing officers in the USA & in South America have been additionally named.
Attorney Robert Capers expanded on details of the indictment during a press conference, explaining how the last three presidents of both CONCACAF and CONMEBOL participated in bribery and kickback schemes in exchange for lucrative marketing rights.
Also pleading guilty were Bedoya and former Chilean federation president Sergio Jadue.
Also Friday, a lawyer for former Brazilian soccer federation president Jose Maria Marin, who was indicted in May, said his client has deposited a total of $1 million bail with the clerk of the federal court in Brooklyn, New York. In an earlier exchange, he said he supported the USA investigation “from Day One”.
Webb, a banker from the Cayman Islands, has pleaded guilty to racketeering conspiracy, three counts of wire fraud conspiracy and three counts of money-laundering conspiracy.
“I keenly sense that reform is inevitable.
You will not escape our focus”, US Attorney General Loretta Lynch said. Eight more guilty pleas were unsealed Thursday, when the Justice Department announced a 92-count superseding indictment that expands on the earlier charges.
Sources close to the investigation told EFE that the agents entered the office and copied the hard drives of some of the company’s computers. As part of his plea, disclosed Thursday, Huguet agreed to forfeit more than $600,000.
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Then he was woken from his bed, and walked into an unmarked auto heading for a Swiss police cell.
