The former Swiss Court of Appeal, the former European Football Association (UEFA), acquitted Michel Platini and former president of the International Federation (FIFA), Switzerland Joseph Blatter, once again in a corruption case which broke the aspirations of the French to hold the presidency of the highest football organization in 2015.
As in the first case, in 2022, the Court of Appeal of the Appeal of the Federal Criminal Court held in Motations (North West) did not respond to requests for prosecution, which, in early March, asked that each of the accused be imprisoned for 20 months with a suspended implementation.
Platini, 69, who won the golden ball for the best European player 3 times in a row (1983, 1984 and 1985), told journalists while leaving, “My Honor is prepared” and “now the 10 -year persecution by the International Football Association (FIFA) and some Swiss Federal Prosecutors” ended.
“They wanted to prevent the presidency of the international federation … I know that time was an important factor for my enemies. They do not care about a million dollars: this is the time factor. They kept me for 10 years.”
Referring to the absence of FIFA at the engine hearing, despite his great lawyer in the court of first instance, he concluded: “They did not attend the call session. They know very well that they won. We know it.”
In turn, Blatter said: “I am happy to release this pressure that exhausted me for ten years. It was a difficult period for me, and now justice was done. It is an important moment for me, for my family and my friends.”
10 years of surveys
After almost 10 years of investigations and the issuance of an innocence before the Court of First Instance, the door is still legislative to submit a final appeal to the Cassation before the Swiss Federal Court, but only on limited legal principles.
For a period of 4 days, like Platini and Balater, 89, again to “obtain illegal, to the detriment of FIFA, the amount of two million Swiss francs (1.8 million euros)” for “in favor of Michel Platini”.
The accusation and the defense agreed from a point, namely that Platini worked as a consultant to swing between 1998 and 2002, during his first mandate at the head of “FIFA”, and the two men signed a contract in 1999 in which they agreed from an annual salary of 300,000 Swiss francs, which “FIFA” is entirely paid.
But in January 2011, the former star of the French national team and Juventus demanded that he became president of the European Football Association (2007-2015) to “the amount of two million Swiss francs (1.8 million euros)”, which the accusation described as a “false bill”.
Gentlemen ‘agreement
The two men insist that they agreed at the start of an annual salary of a million Swiss francs, by an “oral agreement between the masters” without witnesses, and that “FIFA” did not allow him to pay him immediately to Platini.
“The reason behind the current procedures (which started in 2015 after the resignation of the plateau) was only to prevent Michel Platini from becoming president of the International Football Association,” said Platini lawyer Dominic Nilin, in court.
He also called for a “moral compensation” for his client, whose career and reputation were “destroyed” at a time when he appeared, as president of “Wiva” and is still at the top of his sports glory, in an ideal position to take control of world football.
But legally, the context of the case is of great importance.
On the other hand, Blatter confirmed during the trial that the French “deserved the amount”, before Platini recounts the details of the negotiations. “A million Swiss francs,” said.
Corruption
In his procedural acts, the prosecutor Thomas Hildbrand underlined the “contradiction” with a 1999 contract, and the contrast to the usual practices of authority, and in general those linked to the world of work, and revealed audit reports which show that FIFA still has abundant cash reserves.
Is the problem of identifying a version the most credible? No, recalled Dominic Nilin, because the burden of evidence in criminal procedures is the responsibility of the accusation “It is not the responsibility of the defense to prove the existence of such an oral agreement”, but the responsibility of the accusation is to prove that the accused has fraud.
However, in 2022, the Federal Criminal Court acquitted the two men in the first place, since fraud was “not proven as being close to certainty”, even if a decision without registration written with such a high salary seems “somewhat unusual”.
The defense also said that Blatter had no “motivation” to defraud FIFA, because he did not win a year of this problem, while Platini “would find different ways of much simpler” for wealth such as negotiation of a reward or the signature of a new contract.
Beware, Hilderland recalled Platini’s support for Blatter’s re-election for a fourth term in May 2011, which raised doubts about corruption in the courtroom.
But “Blatter considered this unproven hypothesis”, according to his lawyer, his compatriot Lorenz Irny.