By Andrew Warshaw
May 1 – In a new and unexpected twist to the FIFAgate scandal that the current regime of Gianni Infantino is determined to move on from, Israel’s largest bank, Hapoalim, has been dramatically dragged into the long-running saga by agreeing to pay $30 million for its previously unknown role in money laundering.
Simultaneously the bank also agreed to fork out an astronomical $875 million in a deferred prosecution agreement after pleading guilty to hiding $7.6 billion in more than 5,500 secret Swiss and Israeli bank accounts.
The US Justice Department disclosed Thursday that Bank Hapoalim and its Swiss subsidiary had pleaded guilty of conspiring, through unnamed employees, to launder over $20 million in bribes and kickbacks from December 2010 to February 2015 to high-profile figures who have been caught up in the scandal that has snared a spate of household names in football’s political heirarchy.
“For nearly five years, Bank Hapoalim employees used the US financial system to launder tens of millions of dollars in bribe payments to corrupt soccer officials in multiple countries,” said assistant attorney general Brian Benczkowski.
“There is no excuse for a foreign financial institution to unlawfully assist wealthy Americans in flouting their responsibilities to pay their taxes,” added Internal Revenue Service criminal investigation chief Don Fort.
“With today’s guilty plea, Bank Hapoalim is taking responsibility for their role in deliberately breaking the law and undermining the integrity of this nation’s tax system.”
The scheme apparently took place through the banks’ Miami branch, with many of the payments linked to marketing rights for the Copa America. Eugenio Figueredo, former president of Conmebol and Uruguay’s federation, was among those accused of receiving the bribes, as was Luis Bedoya, former president of Colombia’s federation and, like Figueredo, a one-time member of FIFA’s executive committee.
As part of a non-prosecution deal, Bank Hapoalim BM in Israel and its wholly owned Swiss company Hapoalim Ltd agreed to forfeit $20.73 million and pay a fine of $9.33 million.
But William Sweeney, assistant director of the FBI’s New York field office, said the case highlighted “the spider web of bribery, corruption and back-room deals going on behind the scenes as soccer games were played on the field.”
“Bank Hapoalim admits executives looked the other way, and allowed illicit activity to continue even when employees discovered the scheme and reported it.”
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