SPORTS BETTING
Brazil – Match fixing inquiry to hear from key witnesses
By James - 25 May 2023
The Parliamentary Commission of Inquiry (CPI) into match fixing announced that they will hear testimony from those responsible for the Maximum Penalty Operation, from the Public Prosecution Service of Goiás.
According to the Brazilian Senate News Agency invitation requests to prosecutor Fernando Cesconetto and attorney general Cyro Terra Peres were both approved and they should both be heard in a public hearing next week.
Launched in early April, the task force in Goiás has already denounced 16 people for manipulating the results of 13 football matches.
The commission will also listen to police officer Hugo Jorge Bravo, and president of Vila Nova Futebol club, who denounced cases of match-fixing committed within his own club which led to the operation in the first place. The committee will also be granted access to the status of other ongoing investigations.
Deputy Ricardo Silva highlighted the importance of investigating the origin of funding for agreements between athletes and gamblers, which had the objective of manipulating the results of matches.
“We need to move on to the origin of the money, because we have an ongoing investigation by the Public Ministry, but we will have a deeper mission to reach the big fish, to prove who is financing this,” he said.
The rapporteur of the CPI, Deputy Felipe Carreras stated that the work of the CPI is not limited to what has already been verified by the Prosecution Service of Goiás
“The investigations are not limited to what has already been found and the ongoing police investigations. This means that other athletes and bettors not yet mentioned can be reached, such as club officials and other sports professionals”, he said.
The forecast is that the opinion will be presented to the commission on September 18th.
The CPI will also extend its work to professional games in women’s football. Felipe Carreras pointed out that the irregularities “are not restricted only to men’s professional football”, since “women’s professional football is also already being affected by this plague”.
