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Soccer fans unite. It’s about that time.
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It's previously been hosted in Germany (2011), the USA (2003, 1999), China (2007, 1991), and Sweden (1995).
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It was founded in 1991.
McDonald was issued a restraining order on Monday when he was arrested for allegedly assaulting a woman while she was holding an infant. He was released on bail and cut from the Chicago Bears the same day.
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On Wednesday, May 27, 2015, at about 2:52 PM., Santa Clara Detectives learned Ray McDonald violated a restraining order for being at a residence in Santa Clara. Detectives later located Ray McDonald at a nearby Togo's Sandwiches, 2203 Tasman Dr. in Santa Clara. Ray McDonald was arrested without incident and transported to Santa Clara Police Department for processing. He will be booked at Santa Clara County Jail.
The restraining order Ray McDonald violated was issued as a result of his earlier domestic violence and child endangerment arrest which occurred in Santa Clara on May 25, 2015.
Signed in March, McDonald never played for the Bears before being released.
McDonald started his NFL career with the San Francisco 49ers, but was cut from the team in December when he was accused of sexually assaulting a woman. In August 2014, McDonald was arrested for allegedly assaulting his pregnant fiancee.
Charges were dropped in the August incident because the victim did not cooperate with the police investigation. Formal charges were never brought for the sexual assault allegation, and McDonald later brought a defamation suit against the woman who accused him.
When 49ers GM Trent Baalke explained their decision to cut McDonald in December, he pointed to a "pattern of poor decision making."
In a statement on his release, Chicago Bears GM Ryan Pace said:
We believe in 2nd chances, but when we signed Ray we were very clear what our expectations were if he was to remain a Bear. He was not able to meet the standard and the decision was made to release him.
McDonald's signing with the Bears made headlines because of his recent spree of legal issues and an interview given by Bears chairman George McCaskey about how they conducted their interview into the accusations: "An alleged victim, I think -- much like anybody else who has a bias in this situation -- there's a certain amount of discounting in what they have to say."
BuzzFeed News has reached out to the NFL for comment. The Santa Clara Police Department said "further information will be released when it is available."
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After U.S. Attorney General Loretta Lynch announced charges Wednesday against 14 international soccer officials and corporate executives over alleged corruption at the pinnacle of the world's most popular sport, the first question she was asked by a reporter at her Brooklyn, New York, press conference was about a man not named in the federal indictment: Sepp Blatter.
The 79-year-old has captained soccer's world governing body, FIFA, since 1998, despite his organization being dogged by corruption allegations for years.
"We used to call him years ago the 'Teflon Man' because nothing sticks," one former European senior sports media executive, who asked to remain anonymous in order to speak freely on the issue, told BuzzFeed News. "He gets away with everything."
In her response to the reporter's question, however, Lynch made clear that Blatter isn't yet out of the woods: "I'm not going to comment on the status of any individual who isn't named to date, because that would be unfair...[but] I can say this investigation is ongoing. It's continuing."
For years, allegations have simmered about ugly, criminal conduct at the highest levels of "the beautiful game:" bribes and kickbacks from sports marketing companies to FIFA officials in exchange for lucrative contracts; an insular executive concerned only with protecting — and enriching — itself; a bidding process for the 2018 and 2022 World Cup tournaments marred by purchased votes (a claim Swiss prosecutors are now investigating, in addition to FIFA's Ethics Committee). But, despite it all, no evidence has been found to tie Blatter to any of the alleged criminal conduct.
"He's street smart," the European senior executive told BuzzFeed News. "There is nothing written down because he uses all his idiots around him to do the dirty work so he's never in the firing line."
"He's the 'Godfather,'" the executive added, describing FIFA as a mob-like organization. "He created this system."
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Alexandra Wrage is a corporate governance consultant who was hired by Blatter to sit on a FIFA committee designed to clean up the organization. She ultimately resigned in April 2013 out of frustration at a perceived lack of progress.
Wrage told BuzzFeed News the sport's governing body had been corrupt for years.
“It’s really time for FIFA to draw a line and put this era of corruption behind them,” she said. “Shoddy governance, widespread misconduct, and now clearly illegal conduct cannot continue — and neither can those who have presided over it.”
Before the federal charges were announced Wednesday, Blatter was widely expected to be comfortably re-elected for a fifth term as FIFA president at a meeting of officials on Friday. Among those calling for a postponement of the FIFA Congress meeting and presidential elections was the executive committee of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA), one of six continental confederations that comprise FIFA.
"There is a need for the whole of FIFA to be 'rebooted' and for a real reform to be carried out," UEFA said in a statement, citing "a strong need for a change to the leadership of this FIFA."
Loretta Lynch and Kelly Currie at Wednesday's news conference.
Shannon Stapleton / Reuters
Also calling for a "new start" for FIFA was Acting U.S. Attorney Kelly T. Currie of the Eastern District of New York, who helped steer the Department of Justice investigation.
"After decades of what the indictment alleges to be brazen corruption, organized international soccer needs a new start," Currie said.
"Let me be clear: This indictment is not the final chapter in our investigation," he said, echoing Lynch's comments.
But, under American law, any possible charges against Blatter by U.S. officials will depend on prosecutors finding evidence of not only criminal conduct, but conduct which somehow spread, however slightly, to the U.S. legal or financial/banking system.
"If you look at what happened today," the European executive said, "you only have people from North, Central, and South America who were arrested." (Briton Costas Takkas, attaché to the president of Confederation of North, Central American and Caribbean Association Football, was the only exception.) "They have only indicted people who committed a crime on American soil, involving an American bank — something where the Department of Justice can really get its hands on."
The indictment, the executive said, doesn't apply to the African and Asian football officials who, in his words, "are so much worse than the guys arrested today."
"If you arrested everyone involved with corruption today, you probably wouldn't have a FIFA Congress," he said.
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Blatter has previously made light of the corruption allegations against his organization and critics of his tenure as president.
"Perhaps you think I am a ruthless parasite sucking the lifeblood out of the world and out of football — the Godfather of the FIFA gravy train," he told students at Oxford University in 2013. "There are those who will tell you that FIFA is just a conspiracy, a scam, accountable to nobody. There are those who will tell you of the supposed sordid secrets that lie deep in our Bond villain headquarters in the hills above Zurich."
However, despite his past tendencies to shake off controversy, the Department of Justice investigation represents the biggest threat to Blatter's tenure as president, one that could also shake the very foundations of FIFA.
"This is a difficult time for football, the fans, and for FIFA as an organization," Blatter said in a statement Wednesday. "We understand the disappointment that many have expressed and I know that the events of today will impact the way in which many people view us."
For now, though, Blatter's somber mood has his detractors celebrating.
"I'm really cheerful today," the sports media executive told BuzzFeed News. "It's a good start. It's only the beginning, but I don't think Blatter is sleeping well at the moment."
If elected, Prince Ali bin Hussein vows to make FIFA more transparent.
Prince Ali Bin Al Hussein
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Despite arrests of seven FIFA officials on corruption charges on Wednesday, soccer's governing organization said the election will proceed as scheduled. Presidential elections occur every four years during the year after the World Cup.
Prince Ali bin Al Hussein was originally one of four candidates running against Blatter, who has held the position since 1998. One candidate, Jérôme Champagne, did not receive enough votes in the preliminary vetting process, and Luís Figo and Michael van Praag withdrew voluntarily.
Figo on Wednesday issued a scathing statement about the election process, which appoints a leader through popular vote from the 209 member clubs. In the first round, a candidate can win by receiving 2/3 of the vote. If that is not reached, the candidate with the majority of votes in the second round is appointed President.
Figo said:
[T]his electoral process is anything but an election.
This (election) process is a plebiscite for the delivery of absolute power to one man - something I refuse to go along with.
That is why, after a personal reflection and sharing views with two other candidates in this process, I believe that what is going to happen on May 29 in Zurich is not a normal electoral act.
He added:
I am seeking the presidency of FIFA because I believe it is time to shift the focus away from administrative controversy and back to sport. [...] The message I heard, over and over, was that it is time for a change. The world's game deserves a world-class governing body — an International Federation that is a service organisation and a model of ethics, transparency and good governance.
The morning of the Switzerland arrests, Prince Ali tweeted about some of FIFA's institutional failings:
We cannot continue with the crisis in FIFA, a crisis that has been ongoing and is not just relevant to the events of today. FIFA needs leadership that governs, guides and protects our national associations. Leadership that accepts responsibility for its actions and does not pass blame. Leadership that restores confidence in the hundreds of millions of football fans around the world.
His half-brother, Abdullah, is the current King of Jordan. Their father, Hussein, had 12 children through four marriages. Hussein's first marriage produced a daughter, and Abdullah was his first-born son in his second marriage. Prince Ali is the second child from Hussein's third marriage. Although Abudllah mother is not Jordanian, he was appointed as successor over Ali in 1999.
Prince Ali served in the Jordanian military before attending Princeton University.
The U.S. Department of Justice alleged that money paid by the company to a Brazilian-based sports management company was used to bribe a “high-ranking FIFA official.”
Yifan Ding / Getty Images
A major United States-based sportswear company used a Swiss bank account to pay $30 million to a Brazilian sports management executive – who then used a portion of it to bribe a "high-ranking FIFA official," according to a 166-page indictment, made public on Wednesday, outlining corruption and fraud charges against FIFA and corporate executives.
The sportswear company, which was unnamed in the indictment, began sponsorship discussions with the Brazilian Football Confederation after they won the 1994 World Cup in the U.S. (At the time, Brazil's team has an apparel partnership with Umbro.) Negotiations between the sportswear company and the team "lasted into 1996," according to the indictment, upon which a deal was reached "to be one of [Brazilian Football Confederation's] co-sponsors and to be [Brazilian Football Confederation's] exclusive footwear, apparel, accessories, and equipment supplier."
Nike has been the team's official sponsor of apparel, footwear, and more since 1996. A request for comment from Nike was not immediately returned.
The indictment claims there was a 10-year, $160 million agreement reached between the sportswear company and the Brazilian team, but that "additional financial terms were not reflected in the Agreement."
A portion of the $160 million owed to the team was, according to the indictment, paid to Traffic Group, a Brazil-based sports event management company, for "mediating" the agreement.
The sportswear company also agreed to use a Swiss bank account to pay $40 million to an "affiliate" of Traffic, the indictment said. The affiliate received $30 million directly from the sportswear company between 1996 and 1999, the indictment said.
The founder and owner of Traffic, José Hawilla, who has pleaded guilty to charges, allegedly paid half of that money — "totaling in the millions of dollars" — to a high-ranking FIFA executive as "a bribe and kickback," according to the indictment.
The agreement that involved the three parties came to an early end in 2002, according to the indictment.
According to the DOJ press release:
On Dec. 12, 2014, the defendant José Hawilla, the owner and founder of the Traffic Group, the Brazilian sports marketing conglomerate, waived indictment and pleaded guilty to a four-count information charging him with racketeering conspiracy, wire fraud conspiracy, money laundering conspiracy and obstruction of justice. Hawilla also agreed to forfeit over $151 million, $25 million of which was paid at the time of his plea.
On May 14, 2015, the defendants Traffic Sports USA Inc. and Traffic Sports International Inc. pleaded guilty to wire fraud conspiracy.
Swiss police arrested seven FIFA officials Wednesday morning on corruption charges brought by the United States Department of Justice. A total of nine FIFA officials and five corporate executives were indicted in the massive corruption scandal.
A total of nine FIFA officials and five corporate executives were named in the 47-count indictment and have been charged with "racketeering, wire fraud and money laundering conspiracies, among other offenses" by the United States Department of Justice. Also unsealed Wednesday were guilty pleas on similar charges by four individuals and two companies. The DOJ claims FIFA received over $150 million in bribes from sports marketing companies.
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