Football Leaks hacker Rui Pinto will help the Premier League’s inquiry into Manchester City as fresh evidence of club’s ‘inflated’ sponsorship deals brings new heat in their cash cheat probe
- Manchester City are under investigation for alleged financial fair play breaches
- The inquest began in 2018 when Football Leaks exposed alleged wrongdoings
- The hacker involved in the leak is prepared to help the Premier League’s inquest
- The leak said Sheikh Mansour’s cash injection was hidden as sponsorship money
- The league have not commented on which leaked breaches are being looked at
The controversial figure at the heart of the ‘Football Leaks’ organisation that exposed wrong-doing across global football is willing to assist the Premier League as they continue to investigate Manchester City for alleged breaches of their rules.
Portuguese Rui Pinto, 32, is currently in a witness protection programme in his home country, where a trial against him for alleged hacking and other charges is likely to resume next month.
A self-styled whistleblower, Pinto did a deal with Portuguese judicial authorities to hand over hundreds of millions of documents in his possession that might assist them with various corruption investigations.
Previously under house arrest, he has been at liberty since August last year, albeit with round-the-clock police protection for his own security.
Neither the Premier League nor City will make any comment on precisely what breaches are being looked at, only that the allegations arise from ‘Football Leaks’ materials, sourced by Pinto and published by German magazine Der Spiegel in 2018.
The Football Leaks hacker that exposed alleged financial fair play misconduct against Manchester City will help the Premier League’s investigation into the club
Football Leaks hacker Rui Pinto is the man who exposed Man City’s Financial Fair Play breach
Pinto has now said he is willing to co-operate with the Premier League — and indeed any investigatory body looking at wrong-doing or corruption — if they want assistance.
Pinto’s lawyers, Francisco and Luísa Teixeira da Mota, told The Mail on Sunday last night: ‘Rui remains committed to collaborate with national and international authorities in order to help uncover wrongdoing in football and contribute to football’s transparency.’
The development comes at the end of a week when three of the most senior judges in Britain ruled that the existence of a legal battle between the league and City — now two and half years old — should no longer remain secret.
Dozens of pages of paperwork released in conjunction with the Court of Appeal judgement have laid bare the League’s frustration at City’s long-term non-cooperation and refusal to hand over documents that might incriminate them – or indeed exonerate them.
Football Leaks claimed City owner Sheikh Mansour’s investment was disguised as club sponsorship
The Premier League have not commented on which leaked breaches are in the inquest
League lawyers told one hearing ‘that the tactic the club has adopted has been to make as many procedural applications and complaints as it possibly can in order to slow the day when it will actually have to provide the documents and information.’
Other papers laid out how the Premier League issued a formal complaint against City as long ago as August 2019, seeking disclosure of information, then began arbitration proceedings when City argued the PL wasn’t independent. City began the arbitration process then made a legal challenge to its legitimacy, and have made a series of secret legal appeals since to keep all these matters secret.
This newspaper discovered the extent of the legal wrangling in April but was prevented from reporting them. A judge, under the principles of ‘open justice’, did allow the MoS access of hearings however, which we report upon today.
Another judge, Lord Justice Males, expressed in his verdict to make the case public his frustration at the City’s non-cooperation with the PL.
Manchester City have been crowned Premier League champions twice since the inquest
‘This is an investigation which commenced in December 2018. It is surprising, and a matter of legitimate public concern, that so little progress has been made after two and a half years, during which, it may be noted, the Club has twice been crowned as Premier League champions,’ he wrote.
The Mail on Sunday today reveals fresh details of apparently anomalous sponsorship payments made to City since 2010. It is simply not known what if anything City have now handed to PL investigators, or whether the PL will seek assistance from Pinto at some point.
There are multiple examples of ‘whistleblower’ defences where documents obtained illegally have been used to expose wrong-doing, from Edward Snowden to the Panama Papers. Prosecutors in Belgium, Switzerland, France, Germany and now Portugal among other places have sought Pinto’s help to probe corruption from tax avoidance to money laundering.
In 2019, a former senior FIFA official told this newspaper that FIFA had been using ‘Football Leaks’ documents as a ‘hugely useful investigative tool’ for years, despite being aware they may have been obtained by hacking, because in many cases FIFA could not trust clubs to provide truthful information.
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