Miguel Trujillo, a soccer consultant for FIFA, pleaded guilty to charges of conspiracy to commit money laundering and conspiracy to commit wire fraud today at a federal court in Brooklyn, N.Y. Trujillo admitted to paying bribes for contracts related to international exhibition matches, TV broadcasts and more.
A citizen of Columbia based in Florida, Trujillo, 65, said he paid various national soccer federations hundreds of thousands of dollars to arrange friendlies and secure contracts. He is one of 42 defendants in the U.S. Justice Department's corruption case against FIFA.
Federal authorities tracked Trujillo's illicit payments to Queens, N.Y. He also pleaded guilty to filing a false tax return, which is similar to the kind of activity that sparked the DOJ's investigation.
The feds first noticed Chuck Blazer, an American former FIFA official, failed to file tax returns for his personal income. At a sealed-off hearing in 2013, Blazer pleaded guilty to corruption charges, saying he and other high-ranking officials accepted bribes in relation to the sites of the 1998 and 2010 FIFA World Cup tournaments.
"Beginning in or around 2004 and continuing through 2011, I and others on the FIFA executive committee agreed to accept bribes in conjunction with the selection of South Africa as the host nation for the 2010 World Cup," Blazer said at the time.
Trujillo was fined $495,000 and awaits sentencing, which is also the case for the 12 others who have also pleaded guilty in the U.S.' sprawling case. In all, the 42 people implicated in the investigation were responsible for about $200 million in bribes and illegal payments related to contracts for marketing and TV broadcast rights, as well as international match arrangements.
"I know what I was doing was wrong," Trujillo said.
Trujillo, who declined to comment through his lawyer Joseph Rosenbaum, paid bribes through his company to soccer federations including CONCACAF (The Americas and Caribbean) and four groups within Central America and the Caribbean.
The U.S.' investigation is just one of multiple similar probes aimed at exposing deep, long-running corruption in FIFA. Sepp Blatter, FIFA's former president, has also been implicated as at least having knowledge of bribes or payments that allegedly bought votes for World Cup bids.
FIFA recently elected Gianni Infantino to succeed Blatter and lead the global soccer federation out of this dark period.
