The Spanish Tax Agency’s Regional Inspection Office of Catalonia has issued a new report that directly backs FC Barcelona’s defense in the ongoing “Negreira case,” in an update that may have blown a massive hole to the worst allegations levied against the club.
Investigators concluded that Barcelona’s payments to former referee committee official José María Enríquez Negreira were not used to bribe referees or manipulate match results.
This heavily aligns with Barça’s long-standing stance that the millions
paid over nearly two decades were meant strictly for technical refereeing reports. The matter still needs to be resolved before a judge, but the report is likely to be used as evidence in any legal decision.
The investigation tracked payments totaling more than 7.5 million euros between 2001 and 2018, which was the year Negreira left his post as vice president of the Technical Committee of Referees (CTA). Despite the large sums, the Spanish Tax Agency states that it has not been proven that these amounts were used to “trade for restricted information from the referee committee, influence referee designations, or directly participate in altering match results.”
“No payment to any referee is recorded… no proof exists regarding the possibility of influencing results,” the official report says.
However, the report raises separate questions about the destination of certain withdrawals. There are still questions about potential financial fraud, but the corruption accusations may have lost their teeth. The club’s legal problems are not completely over, but this report may have dealt a huge blow to the worst allegations in the Negreira case.
