Court schedules 16 trial days for summer fairytale affair
16 trial days have been scheduled for the proceedings against former leading DFB officials before the Frankfurt Regional Court in connection with the summer fairytale affair. This is according to a press release from the authorities.
The former presidents of the German Football Association, Wolfgang Niersbach and Theo Zwanziger, as well as the former General Secretary Horst R. Schmidt are accused of tax evasion.
As previously announced, the trial will begin on March 4 next year. The last day of the trial would be July 11. This means that the proceedings will take place in the middle of the home European Championship (June 14 to July 14).
Poor handling of the events so far
In May, the Frankfurt Higher Regional Court restarted the proceedings against the trio, which had previously been discontinued by the regional court at the end of October 2022. At the time, the Higher Regional Court announced that the regional court's discontinuation order had been revoked and the proceedings were to be continued.
This means that, as things stand at present, the so far poor investigation into the events surrounding the 2006 World Cup in Germany will now be brought before a German court after all. Zwanziger, Niersbach and Schmidt have always rejected all accusations.
The regional court discontinued the proceedings on October 27 last year due to the prohibition of double jeopardy, after proceedings in Switzerland had previously been discontinued due to the statute of limitations.
At the heart of the case was a payment of 6.7 million euros made by the DFB via the world association FIFA to the now deceased entrepreneur Robert Louis-Dreyfus. The money was declared as a contribution to a gala for the 2006 World Cup, which never took place. In 2002, Franz Beckenbauer had received a loan of the same amount from Louis-Dreyfus in his function as head of World Cup organization, which ultimately disappeared into the accounts of the former FIFA financial functionary Mohamed bin Hammam.
- Despite the ongoing European Championship in 2023, the trial related to the tax evasion accusations against former DFB officials Wolfgang Niersbach, Theo Zwanziger, and Horst R. Schmidt is scheduled to commence on March 4 and conclude on July 11, potentially overshadowing the soccer event.
- The 2006 World Cup in Germany remains a subject of controversy, with a payment of 6.7 million euros from the DFB to Robert Louis-Dreyfus at the center of the case, which was initially declared as a contribution for a gala event but never took place.
- Franz Beckenbauer, former head of the World Cup organization, received a loan of the same amount from Louis-Dreyfus, a loan that ultimately ended up in the accounts of Mohamed bin Hammam, a former FIFA financial functionary.
- The trial, initially discontinued due to the prohibition of double jeopardy in October 2022, was restarted by the Frankfurt Higher Regional Court in May 2023, underscoring the German public's interest in upholding justice in this complex soccer-related crime case.
Source: www.dpa.com
