FIFAGATE back in the US courts as appeal judges overturn wire fraud verdict
NEW YORK: A United States appeals court has reinstated the convictions of a former Fox executive and an Argentinian sports marketing company for trying to bribe football officials in exchange for lucrative broadcasting contracts.
In a 3-0 decision, the 2nd US Circuit Court of Appeals said a Brooklyn judge erred in throwing out the March 2023 jury verdicts against Hernan Lopez and Full Play Group because she misinterpreted a federal wire fraud law.
Lopez is expected to appeal.
The defendants are among more than 40 to face criminal charges in the FIFAGate scandal which shattered the world football federation’s credibility. At least 31 defendants pleaded guilty, and two other officials were convicted by a jury in 2017.
Prosecutors said Lopez, a former chief executive of Fox International Channels, schemed to bribe officials at South American federation CONMEBOL to win Copa Libertadores rights.
Full Play was accused of scheming to bribe officials at CONMEBOL and the North American federation CONCACAF to win rights to Copa Libertadores and World Cup qualifying matches.
In September 2023, District Judge Pamela Chen said Lopez’s and Full Play’s convictions could not stand because a federal law addressing honest services wire fraud did not reach alleged foreign commercial bribery.
Chen also voided the defendants’ money laundering convictions, because they were based on the fraud convictions.
But in Wednesday’s decision, Circuit Judge John Walker said the wire fraud law applied to the defendants’ role in causing officials to breach duties they owed their foreign employers.
He wrote: “The nature of defendants conduct (bribery), coupled with the character of the relationship between the bribed officials and the organizations to whom they owed a duty of loyalty (employer-employee relationships), place the schemes presumptively within the scope of (the law).”
Walker added that, in any case, Lopez and Fox were based in the United States, and bribery victims had significant US ties.
The appeals court returned the case to Chen, including an advice to address for the first time whether prosecutors proved a conspiracy to deceive CONMEBOL.
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