FC Barcelona have been charged with bribery for payments made to the former former vice-president of the Technical Committee of Referees – Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira – over a 17-year period according to El Debate, which could result in them being banned from the Champions League if eventually found guilty.
Barca paid €7.5 million ($7.9 million) to a company owned by Negreira from 2001 to 2018. This takes in current president Joan Laporta’s first reign as the club’s leader, but Laporta has claimed on numerous occasions that the payments were honestly for consultation work.
The Catalans were charged for “continued corruption between individuals in the sports field” by the Barcelona provincial prosecutor’s office in March as UEFA
EFA
In late July, the European football governing body revealed Barca were “provisionally admitted to take part” in its highest level club competition, the Champions League but made sure it was known that a “future decision on admission/exclusion” was still possible.
The start of September saw El Mundo report that Spain’s Civil Guard had concluded in a report requested by the court that referees under the watch of the Technical Referees Committee’s former president Victoriano Sanchez Arminio and Negreira weren’t always “unbiased”.
According to El Mundo, the Civil Guard found that Sanchez Arminio and Negreira ran an “irregular operation” while overseeing the CTA, where which “would not have always had an impartial support” from a sporting perspective were made.
And now, at the end of the same month, another bombshell has been dropped with the Court of Instruction number 1 deciding that the money paid to Negreira constitutes a crime.
Barca have been accused of bribery, with their former presidents Josep Maria Bartomeu and Sandro Rosell, plus Negreira and his son also charged by Judge Joaquín Aguirre.
It has been emphasised that Negreira “participated in the exercise of public functions” during the period of time that he received payments from Barca, which ceased when he left his position.
For this reason, Aguirre points out that the payments were made only because of the position he held in the body that regulates refereeing in Spanish football.
The news will be of interest to UEFA, who as mentioned reserved the right to take action if further developments arose.
Barca have already gotten their campaign in the 2023/2024 edition of the Champions League underway with a 5-0 win over Royal Antwerp, but they could theoretically be banned from participation for at least a year next season.
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