The Big Event

In this post, I will be telling you about the "Big Event" that started off this controversy. 

Unknown Author. "Flag of FIFA" uploaded 5/31/2009 via wikimedia. Public Domain.

It was a crisp summer morning on May 27th, 2015. All was quiet outside of the Bar Au Lac in Zurich, Germany. Inside of the luxury hotel, a group of FIFA officials began to prepare for the 65th FIFA Congress. Unbeknownst to them, the Swiss Police were gathering outside to perform a large-scale arrest. They moved into the front lobby, requested the room numbers of seven officials in the hotel, and went to each room to arrest them. The tension in the air was palpable as the public was met with a shocking image of the officials being escorted out of the building behind big white sheets by the police. Simultaneously, two more arrests were made at The Confederation of North, Central America, and Carribean Association Football (CONCACAF) headquarters in Miami, Florida. These arrests directly led to investigations in Australia, Colombia, Costa Rica, Germany, and Switzerland.

A few hours after the arrests, the U.S. Justice department released 47 indictments against 14 people involved in the scandal. This marked the beginning of a massive scandal that would change the soccer world. The officials would be tried for a plethora of charges, ranging from embezzlement to bribery to money laundering. Later on December, 16 more officials would be arrested for similar reasons.