Judge spares football bribery trio from jail
TWO players’ agents and a coach were condemned by a judge as he handed them suspended prison sentences in a corruption trial that shocked British football.
The three were convicted of bribery charges last month, after an investigation by The Daily Telegraph exposed their activities.
Giuseppe “Pino” Pagliara, Dax Price and Tommy Wright were convicted of soliciting and accepting bribes in order to gain influence in the selection, management and ownership of players.
The three had their sentences suspended and will not spend time behind bars because of what Judge Jeffrey Pegden QC said were a set of “wholly exceptional” personal circumstances and family responsibilities.
Judge Pegden said he considered the fact that Pagliara “falsely blamed The Daily Telegraph and its journalists” by suggesting in interviews that the paper had induced him to behave corruptly to be an aggravating factor in his case.
Dc Chris Glover, of the City of London Police Fraud Squad, said: “This case is the first in the UK relating to corruption in the football industry and shows how offending of this extremely serious nature can lead to significant prison sentences. We would like to take this opportunity to thank The Telegraph, Football Association, Crown Prosecution Service and Barnsley FC for their assistance.”
Pagliara, 64, of Bury, who played a “leading role”, was sentenced to two years for two counts of paying and facilitating a bribe. His sentence was suspended for two years, and he was ordered to undertake 300 hours of unpaid community work and abide by a 7pm-7am curfew.
Price, 48, his business partner, of Sittingbourne, Kent, was sentenced to 18 months for two counts of paying and facilitating a bribe, suspended for 18 months, with 250 hours’ community work and an 8pm-6am curfew. Tommy Wright, 54, the former Barnsley assistant manager, was sentenced to 12 months for two counts of accepting a bribe, suspended for 12 months. He was also ordered to pay back to The Telegraph the £5,000 he had accepted as a bribe and to pay £12,000 costs.
No costs were awarded against Pagliara and Price after the court heard they were effectively penniless.
Judge Pegden said: “None of you should think that because I have taken the wholly exceptional course of suspending the inevitable sentences of custody, that that decision detracts in any way from
the seriousness of the offences and the gravity with which the court will view any cases of bribery in future.”
The judge told Pagliara and Price: “You revealed your willingness to be involved in a corrupt process. Your aim was to become players’ agents, to buy players as third party owners and to put them in English clubs and profit from their onward sale. Bribery and corruption were the means by which this would happen.”
Judge Pegden said he was suspending the men’s sentences only because he had been convinced by the mitigation pleas that Pagliara’s wife was wholly dependent on him and that Price’s two children would have their lives damaged if he was jailed. He added that he had been impressed by Wright’s “admirable qualities”, particularly his commitment to working with youngsters in football. The sentences followed an undercover investigation by The Telegraph, during which covert recordings of conversations between Pagliara, Price, Wright and undercover reporters exposed claims that backhanders and illicit payments were commonplace in English football. Following an eight-week trial and more than 30 hours of deliberations, the jury at Southwark Crown Court decided the three men had tried to buy influence and solicit favours through secret payments. Pagliara was found to have arranged with Price to pay Wright £5,000, with the promise of another £5,000 to come, in return for encouraging his players to sign with their sports agency, placing their players in the Barnsley first team, arranging a meeting with the club’s owners and supplying confidential player contract information.
The bribe was paid in cash by an undercover reporter posing as an executive for a fictitious Far East sports conglomerate set up by this newspaper in 2016, following a tip-off about corruption in English football.
Pagliara repeatedly denied being corrupt. But during the trial, the jury heard numerous boasts, made in covert recordings, that he was corrupt and was happy to corrupt others. He was heard to say: “I love it when people say ‘Pino is involved in this deal, he’ll corrupt anybody’.” He told a reporter: “Everyone who works with me is dishonest. I’m a f----thief and you don’t try to steal from me.”