Former FIFA president Sepp Blatter speaks to reporters outside the special appeals court, in Muttenz, Switzerland, on March 25.URS FLUEELER/The Associated Press
Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini won again in court Tuesday and now lead 2-0 in trial verdicts against Swiss federal prosecutors.
Once soccer’s most powerful men, former FIFA president Blatter and former UEFA president Platini were acquitted for a second time in a case now in its 10th year on charges of fraud, forgery, mismanagement and misappropriation of more than $2-million of FIFA money in 2011.
Blatter, now aged 89, gave little reaction listening to the verdict of three cantonal (state) judges acting as a federal criminal appeals court. Sitting in the row in front of Platini, Blatter alternately tapped his fingers on his desk or held his left hand over his mouth.
Only when the 55-minute verdict statement was over did Blatter smile before reaching across to shake his lawyer’s hand. Blatter then shared a long hug with his daughter, Corinne.
“You have seen my daughter was coming with tears because she believed in [her] father and I believed in myself,” said Blatter, who spoke of a sword of Damocles being removed from over his head. “To wait such a long time affects the person and my family was very much affected.” Platini sat with his arms folded or rubbing his hands as he listened to a translator sitting beside him relating the court’s verdict in German into his native French.
“This persecution by FIFA and some Swiss federal prosecutors for 10 years is now finished, is now totally finished,” Platini said leaving the court, insisting his honour was restored. “So I’m very happy.”
The attorney-general’s office in Switzerland had challenged a first acquittal in July 2022 and asked for sentences of 20 months, suspended for two years. The indictment alleged the payment “damaged FIFA’s assets and unlawfully enriched Platini.”
“Michel Platini must finally be left in peace in criminal matters,” his lawyer Dominic Nellen said in a statement. “After two acquittals, even the Office of the Attorney-General of Switzerland must realize that these criminal proceedings have definitively failed.”
A further appeal to the Swiss supreme court can be filed by the prosecutors’ office, which said in a statement it “will decide about how to further proceed.”
The court said Platini is entitled to almost 180,000 Swiss francs ($204,000) in compensation and Blatter about 110,000 Swiss francs ($125,000). Most is from the Swiss state and 1,500 Swiss francs ($1,700) each from FIFA.
FIFA was approached for comment on the verdict.
Blatter and Platini have consistently denied wrongdoing in a decade-long case that ultimately came to nothing in court yet totally altered world soccer body FIFA.
The legal case swung on their claims of a verbal agreement to one day settle the money in question.
Blatter approved FIFA paying two million Swiss francs (now $2.21-million) to France soccer great Platini in February, 2011 for supplementary and noncontracted salary working as a presidential adviser from 1998-2002.