Indicted businessman surrenders

FIFA SCANDAL: Alejandro Burzaco and other Argentine partners part of group accused of bribing officials

MILAN— An Argentine businessman who was indicted by U.S. authorities in connection to the FIFA corruption case turned himself in to Italian police Tuesday.

Police spokesman Francesco Bianco said Alejandro Burzaco, who is accused of being involved in a $110-million US bribe, was placed under house arrest after a hearing in Milan.

The 50-year-old Burzaco, who has dual Argentine-Italian nationality, has rented a house in Bolzano.

Burzaco was one of 14 people indicted by American authorities May 27 on bribery, vote-rigging and other corruption charges.

Seven of the indicted men were arrested during dawn raids on a luxury Zurich hotel.

Burzaco was named on Interpol’s most wanted list last Wednesday, along with five other men with ties to FIFA.

Burzaco, and Hugo and Mariano Jinkis, also from Argentina, were named in the U.S. indictment saying they bribed soccer officials in exchange for the media and commercial rights to international tournaments.

Argentine secretary of security Sergio Berni said Tuesday the whereabouts of the Jinkises was still unknown, but authorities were trying to find them.

Burzaco, who is the president of sports marketing company Torneos y Competencias, and the Jinkises merged their companies to form part of Datisa, which obtained the exclusive worldwide rights to the 2015, 2019 and 2023 Copa America tournaments as well as the 2016 centenary edition of the South American championship.

The indictment states Datisa agreed to pay $110 million in bribes to Jeffrey Webb, Eugenio Figueredo, Rafael Esquivel, Jose Maria Marin, Nicolas Leoz and several other soccer officials for the rights.

Leoz, a former FIFA executive committee member who is under house arrest in Paraguay, was also named on the Interpol list.

Also named were FIFA vice-president Jack Warner and Jose Margulies, a Brazilian broadcast executive.

Warner was arrested in Trinidad, but has been released on bail.

— PHOTOS: THE ASSOCIATED PRESS FILES A man holds a sign reading ‘Resign Argentine Soccer Association president’ in front of a sports marketing company in Buenos Aires in late May.

Alejandro Burzaco, right, president of an Argentine sports marketing company, is one of the people accused of paying more than $100 million US in bribes for media and commercial rights to soccer tournaments.