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| June 30, 2006 | Friday | Jumadi-ul-Sani 3, 1427 |
Italian match-fixing trial abruptly adjourned
ROME, June 29: Italy's biggest-ever sports trial considered match-fixing charges against four top soccer clubs and 26 officials on Thursday before a string of procedural motions forced an adjournment until next Monday.
Champions Juventus, AC Milan, Fiorentina and Lazio, four of soccer-mad Italy's elite teams, risk being forced out of the nation's Serie A league and European competition if found guilty of conspiring with referees to rig matches.
Tribunal president Cesare Ruperto opened the trial with a roll call of the accused who stood up behind rows of desks as their names were read inside a spartan, low-ceilinged room in Rome's Olympic Stadium.
But defence lawyers quickly raised a list of objections that forced Ruperto to halt the trial after less than three hours.
“We will adjourn until Monday, July 3,” Ruperto said after allowing five Serie B teams hoping to be promoted -- Bologna, Brescia, Lecce, Messina and Treviso -- to take part in the proceedings and giving them until Monday to prepare their cases.
The Italian Football Federation (FIGC) has promised to finish the trial by July 9, the day of the World Cup final.
However, Thursday's brief proceedings raised questions about whether the tribunal will meet the federation's timetable.
Among the accused packed into the room were former FIGC president Franco Carraro, AC Milan vice-president Adriano Galliani and referee Massimo De Santis, who was barred from the World Cup after the “Clean Feet” scandal erupted in May.
Former Juventus general manager Luciano Moggi, whose tapped phone calls with officials and referee designators triggered the scandal, was not present. He has said he does not need to answer to the tribunal because he has quit Juventus.
The accused are charged with sporting fraud and unfair conduct, which could lead to the teams being relegated and the individuals being either suspended or banned from football.
Juventus runs the greatest risk of being demoted, and the club appeared resigned to playing a year outside Serie A.
“We have worked to get things back to normal and prepare a team that in two years will return to being a winning squad,”
Juventus CEO Carlo Sant'Albano said in a newspaper interview.
At a meeting of Juventus shareholders in Turin which elected a new board, one investor after another stood up and accused the outgoing board of turning a blind eye to dealings they said had tarnished the club's history of 29 Serie A championships.
“If I think of the shares I bought and the season ticket that I had, I involuntarily participated in and financed 'Moggiopoli,'” one shareholder said, referring to the widely used nickname for the scandal.
Juventus shares have lost half their value since the scandal erupted in early May, and were down 0.67 percent at 1.33 euros at 1134 GMT.
The trial will run for the duration of the World Cup in Germany, where 13 players from the four accused clubs play for Italy, who face Ukraine on Friday in the quarter-finals.
FIGC has said any appeals will be heard by July 20, giving it time before a July 27 deadline to submit the names of teams for next season's Champions League and UEFA Cup competitions.
In a reminder that it is a sports tribunal, the judges wore suits instead of the robes that are worn in criminal trials. But prosecutors in four cities have launched criminal probes.—Reuters
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