Mr Hickey’s passport, Olympic credentials and air ticket were seized by police, while emails and messages on his phone form part of the police investigation.
Advertisement
He was taken to hospital as a precaution, and will probably stay the night there, police said.
It was also announced that WIlliam O’Brien would assume the role of president of the Olympic Council of Ireland. He said police called an ambulance to the hotel.
It comes after Irishman Kevin Mallon was arrested in Rio de Janeiro earlier this month, along with his translator Barbara Carnieri of sports hospitality company THG Sports, amid investigations into what police in Rio believed could be a major worldwide touting ring.
It was a marathon, not a sprint, that saw Patrick Joseph Hickey’s career progress over three decades, from Irish athlete to president of the prestigious European Olympic Committees.
Mr Hickey is being supported by Irish diplomats in Brazil.
Hickey was admitted to nearby Samaritano hospital for chest pain after his arrest.
The wife of Pat Hickey lied to detectives when they arrived at his hotel room to arrest him, saying he had returned to Ireland, police in Rio de Janeiro said.
Hickey, 71, was arrested at his Rio hotel after being accused of ticket scalping, ambush marketing and conspiracy.
Another THG staffer was arrested in Brazil in 2014 over the reselling of World Cup tickets.
Brazilian authorities have also issued warrants for four more executives at THG, including Marcus Evans, who owns its parent company as well as English soccer club Ipswich Town.
The Olympic Council of Ireland said Hickey made a decision to “step aside temporarily” as an IOC member and from all his other Olympic positions “until this matter is fully resolved”.
After those arrests, the OCI said it would investigate why some of its tickets were in their possession. “We are treating this matter with the utmost seriousness”, the council said at the time.
There has been no official statement yet from the Brazilian authorities so it is entirely possible that Hickey’s arrest is a procedural stage as police continue their investigations into how Kevin Mallon, a finance director of sports hospitality company THG, was detained on August 5 with several hundred tickets for Olympic events, many of which came from the OCI’s allocation for the Games.
Police said they suspect he had changed rooms to try to evade arrest.
The tickets are believed to have been allocated to OCI and were alleged to have been put up for sale at high fees as part of a hospitality package. He remains in the hospital under police custody. He has been head of the OCI since 1989.
Advertisement
Hickey is also a senior vice president of the Association of National Olympic Committees. In 2015, he led the first European Games organised by the EOC in Baku, Azerbaijan.
