A former high official of the Slovak Football Association, Vladimír Wänke, will go to prison as the Slovak Supreme Court confirmed the verdict of the Special Court in Pezinok from April 7, 2009, which sentenced Wänke to three years and fourth months in prison for soliciting a bribe, the SITA newswire reported. Wänke was also sentenced to a €2,000 fine.
Both the defendant and the prosecutor appealed against the initial verdict but the Supreme Court rejected both appeals on Monday, November 29.
Wänke was arrested on March 6, 2007 in his office at the Slovak Football Association (SFZ) in Bratislava as he accepted a ten thousand Slovak-crown bribe (€330). Wanke requested a so-called 'revenue stamp', allegedly a code name for a bribe, for speeding up registration of the transfer of football player Andrej Masarovič from an Austrian club to SK Eldus Močenok.
The key witness at that time was SK Močenok owner Stanislav Szabo, who participated in the investigation as an agent provocateur, handing over the bribe and recording the entire meeting on a camera, SITA wrote.
Wänke was the long-standing chairman of the SFZ League Commission, the Sports Director of the Association, the head of the SFZ Register and since 2007 also the acting Secretary General.
Source: SITA
Compiled by Zuzana Vilikovská from press reports
The Slovak Spectator cannot vouch for the accuracy of the information presented in its Flash News postings.
