The DFB supported the corrupt system of the FIFA, booked the ominous 6.7 million euros in the awareness of a crime and then wasted a lot of money – the judge said on the last day of the “summer fairy tale” process. Her punishment was mild.
The punishment of 110,000 euros, which the presiding judge Eva-Marie Distler imposed on the 34th and last day of the trial before the Frankfurt Regional Court, we were able to get over the DFB. Distler thus followed the perspective of the public prosecutor, who accused the DFB of evading taxes of around 2.7 million euros in the 2006 World Cup affair and had requested a fine of 270,000 euros. The court followed in his judgment of the view of the prosecution, which had spoken of a high criminal energy in the case in the beginning of their plea at the beginning of the week.
According to everything the criminal chamber had carried out before the judgment regarding severe tax evasion, it will have priced in the fact that the DFB did not receive the acquittal required by its lawyers. Overall, the DFB was even sentenced to payment of 130,000 euros. The association was 20,000 euros because of the “Constant proceedings in the rule of law” enact.
One -hour billing with the DFB
So far, so manageable for the DFB. But the one -hour settlement in the reasoning, which the judge carried out in deliberately easy -to -understand language, should hurt the largest sports association in the world and sound in her ears. Distler spared nothing and nobody. “Catastrophic” was the cooperation of the DFB with the investigative authorities in a procedure that lasted ten years and a “Damage” have added.
The current officials around President Bernd Neuendorf also got their fat away. For example, none of them appeared on one of the 34 days before the Frankfurt am Main Regional Court to listen to at least once, and even at a search in the association center, only someone from the communication department was present. “The other”according to Distler, be “The presentation of a new sponsor on the same day was probably more important”. It therefore allowed herself the question: “The DFB actually takes the judiciary seriously.”
None of the former three accused was in the jury on Wednesday (June 25, 2025) when the verdict was spoken. But the two former presidents of the DFB, Wolfgang Niersbach and Theo Zwanziger, as well as the former general secretary Horst R. Schmidt, were given a lot from the court. Especially this: “The procedure showed how football Germany was part of the FIFA system and, at least in the past, actively supported it.”
DFB leaves open whether he goes into revision
The DFB can appeal against the judgment within a week. The procedure would then land in front of the Federal Court of Justice (BGH). In a statement, the association left open whether it would make use of this possibility.
Judge Distler made it clear in Frankfurt that the judgment also had an impact on an already pending procedure before the Finance Court in Kassel. In this procedure, the DFB complains against the dismissal of the non -profit nature for 2006, because of the 22 million euros in taxes.
For the years 2014 and 2015, the DFB was also revoked due to other allegations that are still to be negotiated. In the bad case for the association, he must therefore pay taxes in the double -digit millions.
Several times is talking about “bribes”
The system consisted of corruption, and Eva-Marie Distler made it sound that this could still be the case today. At that time – the processes relevant to the procedure essentially date from the years 2000 to 2007 – corruption was normal. Therefore, the DFB referred ten million Swiss francs to a Mohamed bin Hammam company in his home country in his home in Katar, to impart a grant of 170 million euros for the 2006 World Cup.
The court would have loved to find out what the official of the World Association FIFA did with the ten million francs, which, including interest and equivalent to the ominous 6.7 million euros, that throw the shadow on the 2006 World Cup, also known as the “summer fairy tale”. Several times Distler spoke of “Braups”and she stated that the formerly accused whose procedures had been hired after payment of a money requirement knew that they bribed.
“Anyone who says in front of the chamber that he knew nothing about it, the chamber gives no believing. The fact that this plan ends in a tax evasion was clear to everyone”says Distler. The problem for the trio was that they knew about the risk of losing charitable status. So the payment in the books had to be veiled, and so the legend for the grant for a – ultimately canceled – gala of FIFA was knitted the day before the opening game.
Will recognized for processing
It was only in 2015 that a publication in the news magazine “Der Spiegel” revealed that Germany had not avoided the FIFA system either. Wolfgang Niersbach resigned after a bizarre press conference in which he stammered all the time.
Even before the Frankfurt court, then as a witness, he pretended that during his time as Vice President and media director of the organization committee for the World Cup, he was cut off from important information and negotiations. The incorrect tax return in 2007, which he then signed as Secretary General, he did not look in nor understood or understood in details. “We didn’t take the unsuspecting press fuzzi from the start”etched Distler.
The judge granted the association to have shown the will for processing. The implementation with the involvement of the law firm Freshfields and later the private investigators of Esecon, however, was defective, not beneficial to the procedure that has now been concluded and above all “Waste of money” been. Who commissioned all of this. Basically, discharged. One of the last questions of the court was a rhetorical: “How is the DFB actually advised?”