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Soccer Official Chuck Blazer Admitted Accepting Bribes for World Cup Votes Soccer Official Chuck Blazer Admitted Accepting Bribes for World Cup Votes
(about 4 hours later)
A former American soccer official linked to the FIFA corruption scandal admitted that he and others on the organization’s executive committee had accepted bribes for their support in the bidding to host the 1998 and 2010 World Cups, according to papers filed in the official’s criminal case and released on Wednesday. It was three days before Thanksgiving in 2013. In Zurich, FIFA issued a news release announcing that it was fighting match-fixing, and Sepp Blatter, FIFA’s president, celebrated after a Swiss initiative to cap soccer managers’ pay had failed.
The official, Chuck Blazer, made the admission when he pleaded guilty in 2013 to charges that included racketeering, wire fraud, money laundering and income tax evasion. And in Brooklyn, where it was a brisk, dry Monday, Chuck Blazer entered Courtroom 10A South in a wheelchair. After the judge ordered the doors locked and the hallway cleared of lurkers, Mr. Blazer admitted that he had taken bribes from bidders seeking to host the 1998 and 2010 World Cups, and then he uttered the plea that would help lead to corruption charges against top officials of FIFA: guilty.
“Among other things, I agreed with other persons in or around 1992 to facilitate the acceptance of a bribe in conjunction with the selection of the host nation for the 1998 World Cup,” Mr. Blazer told Judge Raymond J. Dearie when he pleaded guilty in 2013. “Among other things, I agreed with other persons in or around 1992 to facilitate the acceptance of a bribe in conjunction with the selection of the host nation for the 1998 World Cup,” Mr. Blazer told Judge Raymond J. Dearie when he entered his plea in 2013 in United States District Court in Brooklyn.
Other papers filed in the case say that it was the Morocco bid committee that bribed Mr. Blazer. He also said that “I and others on the FIFA executive committee agreed to accept bribes in conjunction with the selection of South Africa as the host nation for the 2010 World Cup,” and that he “and others agreed to accept bribes and kickbacks in conjunction with the broadcast and other rights” to several Gold Cups, a regional championship in which the United States competes. Other papers filed in the case said Morocco’s bid committee had bribed Mr. Blazer; the 1998 tournament was eventually awarded to France.
Facing up to 20 years in prison, Mr. Blazer became a cooperating witness, according to law enforcement officials, though in the redacted version of the plea hearing filed Wednesday, there were no references to Mr. Blazer’s cooperating with the government. However, law enforcement officials said that part of Mr. Blazer’s cooperation deal included secretly recording conversations. Mr. Blazer also said that “I and others on the FIFA executive committee agreed to accept bribes in conjunction with the selection of South Africa as the host nation for the 2010 World Cup,” and that he “and others agreed to accept bribes and kickbacks in conjunction with the broadcast and other rights” to several Gold Cup tournaments, a regional championship in which the United States competes.
There are at least two other cooperating witnesses in the FIFA case that suggest the kind of agreement Mr. Blazer may have struck: Daryan and Daryll Warner. They are sons of Jack Warner, the former president of Concacaf, the soccer governing body overseeing North American, Central American and the Caribbean. Mr. Blazer, a friend of Mr. Warner’s, was Concacaf’s general secretary from 1990 until 2011. Facing up to 20 years in prison, Mr. Blazer became a cooperating witness, law enforcement officials said, although in the redacted version of the plea hearing filed Wednesday, there were no references to Mr. Blazer’s cooperating with the government. However, law enforcement officials said that part of Mr. Blazer’s cooperation deal had included secretly recording conversations. Eric Corngold, a lawyer for Mr. Blazer, declined to comment.
When each of the Warner sons pleaded guilty in 2013, the judge outlined their cooperation agreements with the government: They agreed to participate in undercover activities, hand over documents, regularly meet with prosecutors, testify when requested, and not divulge their cooperation to anyone without the express permission of prosecutors. There are at least two other cooperating witnesses in the FIFA case that suggest the kind of agreement Mr. Blazer may have struck. They are Daryan and Daryll Warner, sons of Jack Warner, a former president of Concacaf, the soccer governing body overseeing North America, Central America and the Caribbean. Mr. Blazer, a friend of Mr. Warner’s, was Concacaf’s general secretary from 1990 to 2011, and both were members of FIFA’s governing executive committee for years. The committee’s functions include awarding the hosting rights for the quadrennial World Cup.
In return, prosecutors said, they would file a letter at sentencing noting each defendant’s cooperation and asking for a departure from sentencing guidelines. Prosecutors often suggest little or no prison time in return for cooperation. For Daryan Warner, prosecutors also said they would suggest he receive an S-Visa, or an informant green card. When each of the Warner sons secretly pleaded guilty in 2013, the judge outlined their cooperation agreements with the government. They agreed to participate in undercover activities, hand over documents, regularly meet with prosecutors, testify when requested, and not divulge their cooperation to anyone without the express permission of prosecutors.
In return, prosecutors said, they would file a letter at sentencing noting each defendant’s cooperation and asking for a departure from sentencing guidelines. Prosecutors often suggest little or no prison time in return for cooperation. For Daryan Warner, prosecutors also said they would suggest he receive an S visa, or an informant green card.
Mr. Blazer, 70, is now in a hospital, a fact that complicates prosecutors’ case if he is indeed a central witness.
A heavy man with a bushy white beard and misbehaving gray curls, Mr. Blazer cut a colorful figure in world soccer. He maintained a blog that chronicled his travels, and photos show him clutching giant beer mugs, raising champagne glasses and generally looking as if he is having a grand time. Sometimes he wore a shirt covered with images of Donald Duck; sometimes he went for a more muted shiny lilac. Here he is with his arm around Dr. Ruth Westheimer, the sex therapist; there he is next to Miss Universe; here in a pirate hat and eye patch; there on a plane with Nelson Mandela.
While he was a soccer executive, prosecutors in the Eastern District of New York said in a case unsealed last week, he took bribes, including $750,000 to support South Africa as the 2010 World Cup host, and also in exchange for broadcast and marketing rights to Concacaf’s Gold Cup tournament, among other things. According to court papers, the Morocco bid committee offered Jack Warner $1 million for his vote for the 2010 World Cup when he and Mr. Blazer were visiting that country, before South Africa stepped in with a higher offer.
Mr. Blazer also accepted a bribe in the bidding for the 1998 World Cup. When he traveled to Morocco in 1992 with someone identified as co-conspirator No. 1, whose biographical details match those of Mr. Warner, a member of the Morocco bid committee offered a payment to the co-conspirator in exchange for his vote that Mr. Blazer helped facilitate.
Concacaf had separately found that Mr. Blazer had committed fraud. According to a 2013 report, Mr. Blazer used Concacaf funds for personal purchases: a $48,554.25 Hummer H2, apartments at the Mondrian in Miami, part of his rent at Trump Tower in Manhattan, and down payments for apartments at the Atlantis Paradise Island resort. The report concluded that he had violated Concacaf’s ethics rules, had committed fraud against the committee, and had not filed United States income tax returns.
Given Mr. Blazer’s bad health — as of last week, he was having trouble speaking — prosecutors may have challenges using his testimony against other defendants if Mr. Blazer cannot testify at trial.
A deposition is one option, said Daniel C. Richman, a professor at Columbia Law School. While courts do not favor them in federal criminal cases, Mr. Richman said, they are allowed “in extraordinary circumstances, and it sounds like this one is.”
However, defendants and their lawyers must be offered a chance to attend and cross-examine the witness — making it logistically complicated given that several of the defendants in the FIFA case have not yet been extradited, with some still at large. Defendants must also be given discovery material and witness statements before the deposition, so the government must be well prepared if it takes that route.
Also, if other defendants are added to the case after a deposition, “those defendants will, definitionally, not be given an opportunity,” Mr. Richman said, so the witness’s testimony cannot be used against the new defendants. Prosecutors have said that this is only the beginning of the case, and law enforcement sources have confirmed that Mr. Blatter is a target of their investigation. However, Mr. Richman said, the government could get cooperation from other defendants and “substitute in new cooperators for the ill witness” to corroborate or replace his testimony.
If Mr. Blazer made any undercover recordings, those can be used whether or not he is present, Mr. Richman said.
The hearing transcript filed Wednesday contained a few biographical details about Mr. Blazer: He attended graduate school in New York; his middle name is Gordon; and he has rectal cancer, Type 2 diabetes and coronary artery disease.
The transcript also showed that Judge Dearie seemed to have the stereotypical American level of interest in soccer as he stumbled over the name of the governing body, saying at one point, “I don’t know how you pronounce it, FIFA.”