November 7 – Former Manchester City defender Benjamin Mendy won a partial victory in his case against the club on Wednesday when a UK judge ruled he should be paid the majority of £11.5 million in unpaid wages that were withheld after he was charged with and later acquitted of sexual offences.
The ex-French international took his case to an employment tribunal last month, claiming he had been assured he would receive his unpaid wages once he had been cleared of the charges.
Mendy, who now plays for French Ligue 2 club Lorient, was found not guilty of six counts of rape and one count of sexual assault in January 2023.
The same jury could not reach a verdict on another count of rape and one count of attempted rape leading to a retrial, during which he was found not guilty.
City stopped paying Mendy in September 2021 until the end of his contract in June 2023. The club’s lawyers said he was not paid because he “was not ready and able to perform his duties … as a consequence of his own conduct”, since he had been held in custody before his trial for breaching his bail conditions.
But employment judge Joanne Dunlop said in her ruling she had concluded that he was “entitled to recover some, but not all of the sums claimed”.
Mendy spent two periods in custody, which accounted for approximately five months of the 22-month period covered by his claim.
Dunlop said in her ruling that City were entitled to withhold Mendy’s pay for two periods he spent in custody. But when Mendy was not in custody, Dunlop found, he was “ready and willing to work” but was prevented from doing so because of suspension by the Football Association and bail conditions “which were unavoidable or involuntary on his part”.
There was nothing in Mendy’s contract that permitted City to withhold his wages in the event of a suspension by the English Football Association and/or bail conditions preventing him from playing.
In those circumstances and in the absence of “any authorisation in the contract for the employer to withhold pay, he was entitled to be paid.”
The exact amount will be calculated by Mendy and the club – or by the tribunal if they are unable to reach an agreement.
Mendy joined City from AS Monaco in 2017 for a fee of around £52 million on an annual salary of £6 million.
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