March 15 – Disgraced former Brazilian powerbroker Marco Polo del Nero has lost his final appeal, this time at Switzerland’s highest court, in his attempt to try and overturn a 20-year FIFA ban for taking bribes worth millions of dollars.
The Swiss Federal Tribunal judgment dated March 4 dismissed Del Nero’s appeal and ordered him to pay CHF 18,000 in legal costs. The full verdict detailing the reasons for the decision will be published at a later date.
Del Nero managed to flee Switzerland when a spate of arrests were made following a 2015 dawn raid at Zurich’s Baur au Lac hotel which gave rise to the Fifa-gate scandal.
He was a member of the FIFA executive committee and head of the Brazilian football federation at the time before being indicted by American federal prosecutors as part of their sprawling investigation.
FIFA banned him for life in 2018 and the Court of Arbitration for Sport cut the ban on appeal to 20 years.
Del Nero, who challenged the CAS ruling at the Swiss Federal Tribunal, has never been extradited to face charges of racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering conspiracies linked to commercial deals for South American football competitions.
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