The president of the Professional Football League, Javier Tebas, sent a letter to the Prosecutor’s Office in the case regarding the payments to the arbitration vice-president, José MarÃa EnrÃquez Negreira, directly implicating two former Barça presidents, Josep Maria Bartomeu and Sandro Rosell, in allegations crimes of disloyal administration and misappropriation, based on a handwritten document of a dead ex-director. The document appeared in another different case, in the so-called Soule case which investigates the alleged diversion of funds from the Spanish Federation chaired by Ãngel MarÃa Villar and in which the League appears as an accusation. Tebas personally related names or surnames that appeared in that document directly to the two former presidents and from there deduced that they could be involved in operations with real estate and movements in “financial institutions and investment banks”. The problem is that the family of the dead manager, Josep Contreras, has clarified the true identity of the people mentioned in the document and that they have nothing to do with the former presidents of Barça.
The letter delivered to the prosecutor’s office on February 22, personally signed by Tebas, does not limit itself to providing the documentation and goes as far as pointing out theories about who the names and surnames appearing in Contreras’ manuscript refer to. The problem is that those theories and speculations did not match reality.
The president of the League defends that he acts with objectivity and seems to distance himself from any hint of accusation. “Neither this part has any speculative spirit, nor does this writing suppose the exercise of concrete accusation against anyone”. Although he then points out that “we consider that the names and surnames recorded in the handwritten note may coincide with the names and/or surnames of certain former managers of the FCB (…)
Next, he refers that “with the name “Román” accompanied by the word “lawyer”, reference could be made to Román Gómez Ponti, former head of FCB’s legal services (…) It is not possible to ignore that the surname “Rosell” coincides with the name of the former president of the FCB between 2010 and 2014, just as the name of “Josep Maria” coincides with that of the former president of the FCB Josep Maria Bartomeu Floreta, who was the highest representative of the FCB between 2014 and 2020″.
In reality, as the family of the deceased has clarified, the document was written decades ago and the names indicated by Tebas refer to Emilio Román, Contreras’ lawyer; Ramon Rosell, accountant of his companies; and Josep MarÃa was an employee of Banca Catalana responsible for the deceased’s accounts in the institution.
Finally, Tebas concludes that “from the documentation that is provided in this letter, and that other that the media indicates is already at the disposal of this Prosecutor’s Office, it is not at all disposable (…) they could present other crimes such as disloyal administration or misappropriation (…)”. The president of the League urges the prosecution to act immediately as “the statute of limitations for the alleged and hypothetical crimes”.
On March 10, the Public Prosecutor’s Office denounced Barça and its two former presidents, as well as some executives, for three ongoing crimes of corruption between individuals in the sports field, disloyal administration and commercial falsehood. But he dismissed the misappropriation raised by Tebas in the letter he sent to the Prosecutor’s Office. The public ministry began its investigation on May 5, 2022 after receiving a report from the Tax Agency that warned of possible crimes in the payments that FC Barcelona made to Negreira between 2014 and 2018 since all the payment in the previous period would be prescribed. The Treasury expressed its suspicions about the 7.5 million that the number two of the arbitrators received between 2001 and 2018 and that “did not correspond to an accredited economic activity” with which it warned that “illegal services could be being covered up” lawful” and paying third parties. The report included the testimony of Negreira who said he had received the payments from Barça to guarantee the neutrality of the referees and that the club would not be harmed. The Treasury investigation, however, clarified that it found no evidence that payments had been made to referees or that the competition had been altered. Even so, the Public Prosecutor’s Office added in its complaint that there were indications that Barça paid Negreira to “carry out actions tending to favor FCB in the decision-making of the referees in the matches played by the Club”.
LaLiga is a sports association under private law that groups and represents the clubs that participate in professional football competitions.
