Swiss AG Forced Off FIFA Probe After Three Secret Meetings
Swiss AG Forced Off FIFA Corruption Case After Secret Meetings
(Bloomberg) -- Switzerland’s Attorney General Michael Lauber was ordered to recuse himself from an investigation looking into corruption at FIFA, soccer’s world governing body.
Lauber and two deputies violated key procedural rules when they failed to report and document three meetings with FIFA head Gianni Infantino, the Swiss Federal Criminal Court said Tuesday.
Lauber had been working with his U.S. counterparts on a sweeping probe into corruption in the game ever since a series of dawn raids stunned soccer executives on the eve of a FIFA congress in Zurich in 2015. His decision, however, to hold two undisclosed meetings with Infantino prompted widespread speculation as to their motivations.
A third meeting with Infantino in 2017 that Lauber didn’t immediately admit to prompted further concern -- and led to an investigation into his behavior and whether he violated his obligations in the course of his FIFA probe.
A spokesman for the Office of the Attorney General said it’s analyzing the decision, and declined to comment further.
Michel Platini, former president of the European soccer federation UEFA, was questioned by police Tuesday after being arrested in a corruption probe of the vote that gave the 2022 World Cup to Qatar, the Associated Press reported. Platini’s lawyer didn’t immediately respond to messages from the AP on the situation.
It was former FIFA secretary general Jerome Valcke, the subject of a Swiss criminal investigation over the awarding of media rights for future World Cups, who demanded recusal of the prosecutors in November.
Tuesday’s decision “shall now hopefully contribute to restore the fairness of the investigation,” Valcke’s lawyers, Patrick Hunziker and Elisa Bianchetti, said in an email. Valcke continues to cooperate with the probe against him and “is confident that all charges will eventually be set aside,” they said.
To contact the reporter on this story: Hugo Miller in Geneva at hugomiller@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Anthony Aarons at aaarons@bloomberg.net, Peter Chapman
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