Mr Mallon was arrested after police seized Olympic tickets in a Rio hotel, some of which were part of the Irish allocation and some for the opening and closing ceremonies and the football final.
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They accuse PRO10 of funneling tickets to THG Sports, which sold them illegally at inflated prices. At the first room the police went to Mr. Hickey’s wife informed police that her husband had already left for Ireland but that was quickly discounted when the cops turned up Mr. Hickey’s passport in the room.
Chef de Mission for the Olympics Kevin Kilty, OCI general secretary Dermot Henihan and CEO Stephen Martin were forced to cancel their flights home and move to different hotels.
In addition, it will hire an accountancy company to review its ticketing procedures in Rio.
Among the communications police said they found between Hickey and executives of THG Sports, an global sports hospitality company, were e-mails with Mr Marcus Evans, the British businessman whose namesake company controls THG.
A leading lawyer in Brazil has said it could be months before Pat Hickey appears in court on charges alleging the mis-selling of Olympic tickets.
“The investigation did not bring one single slight indication that Mr Hickey could be involved with the facts therein investigated, and his detention was required by the police authority under mere assumptions”, Lavigne continued.
The Rio offices of the Olympic Council of Ireland (OCI) have been raided as part of an ongoing investigation into alleged ticketing offences.
A Brazilian judge also ordered the seizure of the passport of stand-in OCI President Willie O’Brien, Senior Vice President John Delaney, and an OCI personal assistant, Linda O’Reilly.
It will investigate “the receipt, distribution and sale of tickets” allocated by the International Olympic Committee and how the Olympic Council of Ireland (OCI) dealt with those tickets, according to just-published terms of reference.
Four other THG employees are also charged including Irishman David Gilmore and Barbara Carnieri, who was arrested with Mr Mallon but subsequently released by police.
A Rio police official said: “We are continuing the investigation into the global scheme of ticket scalping”. No arrests were made during the search on Sunday.
Fraud officers allege that Irish company PRO10 was created to act as a bridge between OCI and THG after this.
Police last week seized 781 tickets, worth around £2.4m, in connection with the probe.
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Thomas Bach, president of the International Olympic Committee, added: “What we know is that [Hickey] has not been heard by a judge yet and, more so, the presumption of innocence prevails”.
