FrankfurtThe appeal trial on suspicion of fraud against former FIFA president Sepp Blatter and former UEFA president Michel Platini, who were acquitted at first instance in 2022, will take place between March 3 and 25.
According to statements made by Dominic Nellen, the lawyer of the former captain of the French national team, the date of the extraordinary appeal court is scheduled for those dates in Muttenz, near Basel.
Blatter, 88, and Platini, 69, were acquitted of fraud charges in 2022. Swiss prosecutors accused the Swiss of illegally granting the former French footballer a payment of more than 2 million euros in 2011 for advice between 1998 and 2002, “damaging FIFA’s assets and illicitly enriching it.”
However, both defendants argued that the sum corresponded to outstanding payments from a verbal agreement relating to Platini’s consultancy work.
The Swiss Attorney General’s Office saw no legal basis for the payment, but the Swiss Federal Criminal Court ruled “in dubio pro reo” (in case of doubt, the defendant is favoured): the defendants were not convicted by the court because doubts about their guilt remained. The prosecutor’s office then appealed the decision.
In the wake of this case, FIFA’s Ethics Committee banned Blatter, who held the post for 17 years, and Platini, who was unable to replace Blatter as head of FIFA, for eight years at the end of 2015. The sanction was reduced to six years by the organisation’s Appeals Committee and subsequently reduced to four years by the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) in 2016.
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– 2024-09-19 00:36:21
