U.S. Prosecutors Charge Former Fox Sports Executives in FIFA Bribery Case
April 06 2020 - 9:06PM
Dow Jones News
By Dylan Tokar
Two former Fox Sports executives have been charged with
participating in a scheme to pay millions of dollars in bribes to
soccer officials in exchange for broadcasting rights.
Hernan Lopez and Carlos Martinez helped bribe officials at
Conmebol, FIFA's soccer confederation in South America, according
to a U.S. indictment unsealed Monday. The two men were high-ranking
executives of a Fox Sports international subsidiary, where they
were responsible for developing Fox's sports broadcasting business
in South America, prosecutors said.
Mr. Lopez, a 47-year-old dual U.S. and Argentine citizen, who
served as chief executive of the Fox Sports subsidiary, and Mr.
Martinez, a 51-year-old dual U.S. and Mexican citizen who served as
the subsidiary's president, were charged with wire fraud and money
laundering, according to the indictment.
"We are certain a jury will swiftly exonerate Carlos, as these
charges are nothing more than stale fiction," Steven McCool, a
lawyer for Mr. Martinez, said in a statement.
Matthew Umhofer, a lawyer for Mr. Lopez, attacked the government
for bringing the charges against his client. "The indictment
contains nothing more than a single paragraph about Mr. Lopez that
alleges nothing remotely improper," Mr. Umhofer said in a
statement.
Prosecutors on Monday also charged Gerard Romy, a former
executive of a Spanish media company, and Full Play Group SA, a
sports marketing company based in Argentina, with wire fraud, money
laundering and racketeering.
A lawyer for Mr. Romy declined to comment. A lawyer for Full
Play said the company would plead not guilty to the charges and
planned to vigorously defend itself at trial.
Prosecutors at the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Eastern
District of New York have secured 26 guilty pleas and convicted two
individuals at trial as part of a sprawling corruption
investigation into FIFA. Fox Sports was first implicated in the
case during a trial in Brooklyn in 2017.
Fox Sports parent Fox Corp. and Wall Street Journal parent News
Corp share common ownership. The subsidiary where Messrs. Lopez and
Martinez worked, Fox International Channels, was absorbed by Walt
Disney Co. in 2019.
Representatives for Fox Sports and Disney didn't immediately
return requests for comment. A Fox Sports spokeswoman at the time
of the 2017 trial said the company hadn't known or approved of any
bribes.
Write to Dylan Tokar at dylan.tokar@wsj.com
(END) Dow Jones Newswires
April 06, 2020 20:51 ET (00:51 GMT)
Copyright (c) 2020 Dow Jones & Company, Inc.
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