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It'd also be easier for FIFA to fight charges in Europe than in the US because in the US nobody gives a gently caress about soccer.
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:08 |
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# ? May 13, 2024 08:39 |
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Their cooperating witnesses are all from the Americas.
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:11 |
1337JiveTurkey posted:It doesn't sound like the banks did anything criminal or even unseemly in this case (that's something I don't say every day), they're just doing their usual thing of moving money between accounts. So I believe Bank of America or whoever didn't know any more about the transactions than any other that its clients were making, but American laws govern transactions made through those banks. Right. I just meant more that this is basically the only way the American DOJ could prosecute a high-profile executive without actually harming any American interests -- i.e., go after what is essentially foreign corruption on U.S. soil. It's a good step but it's also a way to score points for attacking corruption without actually attacking any domestic corruption. Said another way, FIFA executives aren't going to be contributing to any American political campaigns, and the American economy won't implode if they're prosecuted.
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:20 |
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so what you're saying is the EU should handle America's corruption cases
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:27 |
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Mercury_Storm posted:How did the organization start its slipslide into becoming the corrupt entity it is now anyways?
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:27 |
awesome-express posted:so what you're saying is the EU should handle America's corruption cases Would make me ecstatic Start with prosecuting Cheney for war crimes
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:29 |
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Would make me ecstatic Aren't Cheney, Bush and Rumsfeld on arrest lists if they step foot in certain countries?
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:32 |
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paragon1 posted:I wonder if civil asset forfeiture is going to come into play here. I eagerly await "United States v. Immeasurable Fuckton of Dirty Soccer Cash".
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:33 |
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A Winner is Jew posted:Aren't Cheney, Bush and Rumsfeld on arrest lists if they step foot in certain countries? Kissinger is the famous one who has to really make sure it's okay to travel abroad. Not that it matters now he's like 1,000.
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:35 |
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awesome-express posted:so what you're saying is the EU should handle America's corruption cases Don't european and american intelligence agencies share info with each other to get around laws against spying on domestic citizens? I'd imagine they wouldn't want to lose access if they messed with the wrong domestic interests.
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:46 |
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Let's say Blatter didn't commit any crimes on US soil, but he did in Europe, and his arrested flunkies roll over and provide evidence to that end. Is it possible he could be arrested and extradited to the applicable country?
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:52 |
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Ramrod Hotshot posted:Let's say Blatter didn't commit any crimes on US soil, but he did in Europe, and his arrested flunkies roll over and provide evidence to that end. Is it possible he could be arrested and extradited to the applicable country? You don't need to commit a crime to be indicted on RICO charges, you just need to encourage criminal activity within your organization. It's the whole point of a RICO case. Mechafunkzilla fucked around with this message at 23:56 on May 27, 2015 |
# ? May 27, 2015 23:54 |
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Ramrod Hotshot posted:Let's say Blatter didn't commit any crimes on US soil, but he did in Europe, and his arrested flunkies roll over and provide evidence to that end. Is it possible he could be arrested and extradited to the applicable country? I dunno the precise legalese of it but using a US bank to pass bribes is pretty much committing a crime on US soil.
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:55 |
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Raskolnikov38 posted:I dunno the precise legalese of it but using a US bank to pass bribes is pretty much committing a crime on US soil. blatter certainly did not do anything nearly so careless as that seriously, sepp blatter has managed to stay on top of the extremely cutthroat world of international football for years and years and years despite everyone knowing he was corrupt, i can pretty much guarantee you that he's taken pains to insulate himself in a situation like this he is best thought of as a sort of vampire, imo
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:57 |
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V. Illych L. posted:blatter certainly did not do anything nearly so careless as that Blatter may not have but someone in FIFA did and the RICO act gives 0 fucks .
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# ? May 27, 2015 23:58 |
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Raskolnikov38 posted:Blatter may not have but someone in FIFA did and the RICO act gives 0 fucks . Yeah this. RICO is literally the reason why all the NY crime family bosses are in prison for life right now and you can bet your rear end they were way more insulated than Blatter ever was.
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:01 |
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we'll see. i hope y'all are right, certainly
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:02 |
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A Winner is Jew posted:Yeah this. Also, probably responsible for less deaths than Blatter on an individual basis.
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:03 |
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V. Illych L. posted:we'll see. i hope y'all are right, certainly RICO is very likely in the top 5 overreaching American federal laws, which is a high loving bar. It's the nuclear missile of conspiracy prosecutions. The very rare times somebody gets out from underneath a RICO indictment without flipping on a bigger fish is when the case is so mindbogglingly stupid or overbroad that a jury cannot convict with a straight face, because the law itself is written in such a way that everyone is guilty. Prosecutors can and do threaten small time defendants with RICO to get them to take pleas simply because a RICO prosecution is a nearly guaranteed prison sentence in a federal facility with no or limited parole. This, of course, is the case where everyone is guilty so our practice of indicting everything and letting God sort them out will actually work out great for once.
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:17 |
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pentyne posted:Yes. Obviously FIFA couldn't outright say "Drop it or you'll be banned from the world cup" but their influence over football is so massive that any country that cares about it has to play along and wait their turn to bribe the officials. This actually works both ways... for example when the Russian soldiers shot down the Malaysian Boeing 777 in Ukraine, which was full of Netherlands citizens, there was talk that they might pull out of the 2018 World Cup in Russia as a protest. If you want to stir up some serious poo poo, all you need is two important footballing nations in heart of Europe who might be enemies on the football field, but culturally closer to each other, such as Netherlands and Germany, or Italy and France, to be seriously pissed off at FIFA. If for any reason two countries like that decided to boycott a World Cup, there would be a massive outcry from all over Europe and you can bet that at least some heads in FIFA would roll.
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:19 |
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Yeah. When I woke up and read the news I was wholly uninterested, and then midway down the article they mentioned RICO and my eyebrows shot up. I'm amazed it's not mentioned in every headline.
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:20 |
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Gyges posted:Offering the US the World Cup as part of your bribe is like offering a Vegan a nice juicy steak to sweeten the deal. Cleaning up corruption at FIFA would the biggest boost to the US' international reputation in at least a few decades. Zeroisanumber posted:Or getting ready to flip. If it were me, I'd be assembling paperwork and counting how many scalps I can hand to the FBI in order to save my own. They find the easiest guy to coerce then offer him a Get of Jail Free card for someone bigger. Who they then offer a reduced sentence to for someone bigger. And up and up they go.
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:24 |
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:Right. I just meant more that this is basically the only way the American DOJ could prosecute a high-profile executive without actually harming any American interests -- i.e., go after what is essentially foreign corruption on U.S. soil. It's a good step but it's also a way to score points for attacking corruption without actually attacking any domestic corruption. Also, I wouldn't be to sure about US companies not getting hosed right alongside FIFA. http://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2015-05-27/nike-s-deal-seems-to-track-u-s-claim-of-fifa-bribery-in-brazil-ia73w47c
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:34 |
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Once all these FIFA guys lawyer up I imagine the dominoes will fall rather quickly. I'm pretty sure a new Attorney General having people arrested in Switzerland on RICO charges and unsealing some convictions to dickwave is basically the "we are going to grind you into dust, and you should be happy we didn't just drone strike your rear end" of the legal world.A Winner is Jew posted:Also, I wouldn't be to sure about US companies not getting hosed right alongside FIFA. Ghost of Reagan Past fucked around with this message at 00:40 on May 28, 2015 |
# ? May 28, 2015 00:38 |
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It seems obvious to me they'll sideswipe some American companies as that's probably the easiest way to get records. Tell them to roll on who they gave money to or that crush them with FCPA and tag team with the IRS.
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:46 |
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So what I'm getting is, this is the harshest thing the US government could have done to FIFA short of authorizing a drone strike to Sepp Blatter's bedroom. Where does he go from here? Can he save his skin if he runs to Qatar or Russia or something? What if he gets prosecuted by the Swiss instead?
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:46 |
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fspades posted:So what I'm getting is, this is the harshest thing the US government could have done to FIFA short of authorizing a drone strike to Sepp Blatter's bedroom. Where does he go from here? Can he save his skin if he runs to Qatar or Russia or something? What if he gets prosecuted by the Swiss instead? Now that there's blood in the water, the Swiss are acting as well and won't let him leave.
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:51 |
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fspades posted:So what I'm getting is, this is the harshest thing the US government could have done to FIFA short of authorizing a drone strike to Sepp Blatter's bedroom. Where does he go from here? Can he save his skin if he runs to Qatar or Russia or something? What if he gets prosecuted by the Swiss instead?
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:51 |
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Ghost of Reagan Past posted:The Swiss are apparently prohibiting Blatter from leaving Switzerland right now. Why would he leave? He's just about to get re-elected!
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:53 |
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Ghost of Reagan Past posted:The Swiss are apparently prohibiting Blatter from leaving Switzerland right now. If that is true, I think Blatter might be very close to a panic attack right now. He has considered himself absolutely untouchable for the past two decades, around the globe. I guess he failed to take into consideration the simple fact that the Americans don't give a poo poo about football. God bless America
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# ? May 28, 2015 00:54 |
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evilweasel posted:Now that there's blood in the water, the Swiss are acting as well and won't let him leave. Yeah, but they are simultaneously launching their own investigation, don't they? My fear is that they won't extradite him on the account of him being a Swiss citizen and indict him with their own laws instead, which might turn out to be more lenient than RICO. But I don't actually know how this stuff works in Switzerland.
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:06 |
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fspades posted:Yeah, but they are simultaneously launching their own investigation, don't they? My fear is that they won't extradite him on the account of him being a Swiss citizen and indict him with their own laws instead, which might turn out to be more lenient than RICO. But I don't actually know how this stuff works in Switzerland. It's a possibility sure, but even if they don't extradite him when those indicted roll on him (with RICO it's not a question of if but when) he's done and all the evidence that the FBI gets on him will more than likely be used in Swiss court. So while he might not get a room at Leavenworth it's virtually impossible for him to skip any jail time.
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:12 |
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If I had to guess the FBI is working with the Swiss and probably other European agencies. The FBI is going to take down the slam dunk CONCACAF cases which are jurisdictionally clear and pass information to other agencies that will either extradite people or locally prosecute them. It looks like the amount of bribery that goes around is so high and so poorly hidden that once other countries see the slice of pie the US gets from this they'll all jump in.
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:22 |
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While Blatter should probably be in jail, as a real-life Bond villain, what's probably more important is that, once Blatter gets locked up in the US or Switzerland, FIFA's entire power structure is gone and international soccer will have to clean up the gigantic mess. And hell, it probably won't take Blatter getting indicted or even convicted, even after he gets reelected.
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:24 |
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So that begs the question, where does FIFA's influence come from? Why does anyone care about FIFA and just join a new/different organization while cutting off all FIFA ties?
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:29 |
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Powercrazy posted:So that begs the question, where does FIFA's influence come from? Why does anyone care about FIFA and just join a new/different organization while cutting off all FIFA ties? 2. Institutional inertia 3. They own a ton of TV rights 4. Bribes 5. Complacency 6. Bribes 7. The people who had the power were in FIFA's power structure 8. Did I mention bribes yet? 9. Money 10. International play
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:38 |
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tbp posted:blatter : i wish that none of my cronies are able to compete with me for FIFA Presidency...
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:39 |
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I see that wikipedia has already decided what they think of FIFA... http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Racket_%28crime%29#See_also
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:39 |
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Ghost of Reagan Past posted:1. Bribes Couldn't the EU/Switzerland forfeit their TV/Broadcast rights? I guess that wouldn't happen, but if there is blood in the water and it sounds like no one really likes FIFA anyway, couldn't that happen without much backlash?
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:41 |
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# ? May 13, 2024 08:39 |
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Powercrazy posted:Couldn't the EU/Switzerland forfeit their TV/Broadcast rights? I guess that wouldn't happen, but if there is blood in the water and it sounds like no one really likes FIFA anyway, couldn't that happen without much backlash? America would loving riot. NOTE: I have no idea which specific TV rights FIFA owns, but I imagine it's incredibly complex.
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# ? May 28, 2015 01:43 |