New episode in the ‘Negreira case’. Civil Guard agents arrived early in the morning at the headquarters of the Spanish Football Federation (RFEF) to carry out a search. Investigators are seeking both files and documentation related to the 7.3 million euros that FC Barcelona paid to the former vice president of the Technical Committee of Referees (CTA) José María Enríquez Negreira between 2001 and 2018 for unjustified services.
The police action is carried out after the search warrant issued by the judge in the Negreira case, Joaquín Aguirre, head of the Investigative Court number 1 of Barcelona. The registration is directed primarily to the offices of the Technical Committee of Referees (CTA), whose offices are located in the Ciudad del Fútbol of Las Rozas in Madrid. The agents have entered with several boxes with the aim of seizing documentation.
The latest conclusions indicated that there were serious indications that there was “systematic corruption” in the arbitration establishment between 2001 and 2008. This is how blunt the head of the Court of Instruction number 1 of Barcelona is, who opened the door a few weeks ago to investigate the alleged bribes of the FC to the referees so that they could be favored in the matches. The judge of the ‘Negreira case’, in several resolutions, affirms that there are no indications of specific payments to the referees but there is evidence of a crime of bribery José María Enríquez Negreira when he was vice president of the Technical Committee of Referees (CTA), which in Yes, it would be a criminal offense.
The judge was determined to clarify whether the 7.3 million euros that the Blaugrana club paid to Negreira were reflected in the referees’ treatment of Barça during the matches. The judge pointed out that, so far, it had not been possible to prove payments to “specific referees to alter the result of certain matches” but that payments to Negreira, who had decision-making power in the CTA, had been confirmed. And that is why he urges the Civil Guard to investigate whether the money from Barça’s coffers had any type of influence on the playing field.
At the moment, the former presidents of FC Barcelona, Sandro Rosell and Josep Maria Bartomeu, and two former directors of the club are being investigated. They are formally accused of continued crimes of corruption in business, in the form of sports fraud, unfair administration and another of falsification of commercial documents.
#Civil #Guard #searches #Spanish #Football #Federation #Negreira #case