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The world’s most prominent soccer organization has been rocked this morning with the arrest in Switzerland of multiple officials of the Fédération Internationale de Football Association (FIFA) and several allied businesses on charges that include racketeering, bribery, wire fraud and money laundering. The Justice Dept. claims the defendants have been enriching themselves through corruption for more than two decades.
Among those charged today were Jeffrey Webb, a FIFA VP and the current president of CONCACAF, the soccer group’s governing body for North America, Central America, and the Caribbean. He was one of the seven defendants arrested earlier this morning. Webb’s predecessor, Jack Warner, has also been charged. Meanwhile, a search warranted has been executed at CONCACAF offices in Miami.
FIFA and its multiple subsidiary bodies rake in billions of dollars each year in revenue from from media and marketing rights associated with its events, especially tournaments like CONCACAF’s Gold Cup and the FIFA World Cup.
According to the DOJ, since 1991, the defendants and their co-conspirators engaged in fraud, bribery and money laundering for personal gain by allegedly making deals with sports marketing executives who paid bribes and kickbacks to keep their competitors from involvement in FIFA events.
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