Barcelona face charges of corruption over payments the club made to Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira – a former vice-president of Spain’s referees’ committee.
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| Emblem of Spanish La Liga club, Barcelona FC |
It emerged last month that Barca paid Negreira and a company he owns a reported total of 8.4m euros (£7.4m) between 2001 and 2018.
A Barcelona court heard on Friday that Barca, former club officials and Negreira had been indicted for “corruption”, “breach of trust” and “false business records”.
These lawsuits, brought by the Barcelona public prosecutor’s office, target the club, as well as former presidents Josep Maria Bartomeu and Sandro Rosell.
“FC Barcelona obtained and maintained a strictly confidential verbal agreement with Jose Maria Enriquez Negreira so that, in his capacity as vice-president of the technical arbitral committee (CTA) and in exchange for money, the latter carries out actions tending to benefit FC Barcelona in decisions by the referees,” said the public prosecutor’s office.story: BBC
