Talk of mega bribes and throat-slashing gestures at FIFA trial

NEW YORK: A trial exposing rampant corruption in the business of world football ended a day of testimony on Wednesday with a defendant accused of making throat-slashing gestures to intimidate a key witness.
The witness, Alejandro Buzarco, was weeping and appeared visibly distraught as he began his second day of testimony in the FIFA corruption trial in the Brooklyn federal court, prompting the judge to pause the proceedings.
Many in the court assumed Buzarco was upset because a former Argentine football official had committed suicide in Buenos Aires the day before after being implicated in the scandal by the Argentine businessman.
Buzarko, who headed sports marketing firm Torneos y Competencias, had accused Jorge Delhon and another official with a government program that held television rights to Argentine football matches of taking millions of dollars in bribes. Delhon threw himself in the path of a train.
But at the end of the day, the federal prosecutor told the judge that Buzarco reacted as he did because one of the defendants, Manuel Burga, a former head of Peru’s soccer federation, had twice drawn a finger across his neck.
“There has been a new crime committed, intimidation of a witness,” prosecutor Kristin Mace told the judge.Burga’s lawyer, Bruce Udolf, scoffed at the suggestion: “This is a gentle, big, timid man,” he said. “He was scratching his neck.”
Judge Pamela Chen said she was concerned “this might have been an effort to intimidate the witness” and ordered Burga be confined with GPS monitoring and no computer or phone access, except to his lawyer.
Burga is on trial along with co-defendants Juan Angel Napout, formerly head of the South American Football Federation and vice president of FIFA, and Jose Maria Marin, the former head of Brazil’s football federation.
Buzarco, who pleaded guilty in November 2015 to racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering conspiracies, detailed how millions of dollars were paid in bribes to secure television rights to major tournaments.
He said Torneos y Competencia and its partners paid Napout $4.5 million, Burga $3.6 million and Marin $2.7 million. Millions more were promised, he said.All three maintain their innocence.
Buzarco also alleged that his company and Televisa of Mexico and TV Globo of Brazil paid the former head of the Argentine football federation and former first vice president of FIFA, Julio Grondona, a $15 million bribe for television, internet and radio rights to the 2026 and 2030 World Cups.“The money for JG ended up in subaccounts in the Swiss Bank Julius Baer,” he said.
TV Globo obtained exclusive rights in Brazil for the two World Cups, and Televisa and Torneos got them for the rest of Latin America.Buzarco further alleged that TV Globo, Televisa, MediaPro of Spain, Full Play, Traffic and Fox Sports paid bribes for football rights to regional tournaments.
He said Datisa — a joint venture between Torneos, Traffic and Full Play — agreed in March 2013 to pay $10 million to Jeffrey Webb, then head of CONCACAF, and Enrique Sanz, its secretary general, for rights to the 2016 Centennial Cup Americas in the United States.CONCACAF is a confederation of North America, Central American and Caribbean football associations.
Buzarco said he met with Sanz in Zurich in March 2013 to coordinate a schedule of payments for the $10 million.Fox Sports and the Globo group denied the accusations.“Any suggestion that Fox Sports knew of or approved of any bribes is emphatically false,” Fox Sports said in a statement.Globo told Brazilian media it “does not practice or tolerate the payment of bribes” and noted it has not been accused of anything by the US Justice Department.

Federer haunts Cilic in London again
By AFP
LONDON: Roger Federer condemned Marin Cilic to more frustration here as he repeated his Wimbledon heroics against the Croatian with a 6-7 (5/7), 6-4, 6-1 victory in the ATP Finals on Thursday.
Just four months ago and only a few miles across south London, Federer was celebrating his record eighth Wimbledon title after crushing Cilic in a brutally one-sided final.
Cilic had been hampered by a blistered foot and the Croat was reduced to tears during the match as his predicament sunk in.In their first meeting since that All England Club showdown, Federer haunted Cilic once again as he fought back at the O2 Arena.
Having beaten Jack Sock and Alexander Zverev in his first two matches, Federer was already guaranteed to qualify as the winner of the Boris Becker group, but he didn’t take it easy against Cilic.
By extending his current winning streak to 13 matches, the 36-year-old advanced from the Tour Finals group stage with an unblemished 3-0 record for the 10th time in his glittering career.
With Andy Murray, Novak Djokovic and Stan Wawrinka all absent due to injury and world number one Rafael Nadal withdrawing after his first match due to a knee problem, Federer appears to have a clear path to his seventh triumph in the season-ending event.
“It was a tough match. I was in trouble, a set and a break point down, but I found a way out of it and I’m happy to be playing this way,” Federer said.
“It’s nice to play tennis this freely. It gives me a great idea how I want to be on Saturday. I’m looking forward to facing (David) Goffin or (Dominic) Thiem.”
The prize money from Federer’s win over Zverev on Tuesday took him past golfer Tiger Woods to become the world’s highest earning athlete, with a career total of £84 million according to Forbes.
When Federer missed last year’s Tour Finals through injury, it seemed possible he would never recapture his former glories. But this year Federer has been revitalised.Cilic was already eliminated after two successive defeats and could have been forgiven for wanting to get the match over with as quickly as possible before heading off for his holidays.
But the 29-year-old was the more aggressive player in a tight first set which he eventually won in a tie-break.Federer kept plugging away and the world number two was rewarded when Cilic made a couple of costly errors at 4-5 to surrender the second set.
That was Federer’s first break of serve in the match and he quickly added a second, unloading a thumping winner down the line to take a 2-0 lead in the final set.That was all the advantage Federer needed as he looks ahead to Saturday’s semi-finals.