Liga MX Clubs linked to money laundering cases in Argentina

Recently the Argentine Police carried out a raid on the premises of the Argentine Soccer Association (AFA) and offices of several clubs of the first division were raided too. The case established was the case of money laundering regarding transfers made to Liga MX teams. 

Which Liga MX clubs were linked and why?

Several Argentine players transfers to Mexican soccer are now under scrutiny. Some of the Mexican clubs indicted include Rayados de Monterrey, Deportivo Toluca. Rayados de Monterrey was indicted for the signing of Nico Sánchez and Maxi Meza while Deportivo Toluca was indicted for the signing of Enrique Triverio, Jonatan Maidana and Emanuel Gigliotti through the player representative Uriel Pérez.

Which Argentina clubs were raided?

According to the information released by the NA agency, the Attorney General’s Office (Procelac) investigates transfers of soccer players, evasion and money laundering. Uriel Pérez, who works as a players representative under the group of the Argentine promoter Cristian Bragarnik, is very controversial. The affected clubs include Independiente, Racing, Unión de Santa Fe and Gimnasia La Plata.

What has AFA said on the raid?

In a statement released by Argentina Football Association, AFA, it said that "personnel from the Airport Security Police (PSA) appeared at our headquarters and seized copies of the transfer contracts for the athletes Maximiliano Meza, Federico Mancuello, Emanuel Gigliotti, Nicolás Sánchez, Jesús Méndez, Fernando Barrientos, Jonatan Maidana and Enrique Triverio. This Association provided all the necessary collaboration for the judicial order to be carried out, making all the required documentation available to the intervening officials."

What have the Argentina clubs say?

"Agents from the Airport Security Police (PSA) searched Gimnasia’s headquarters looking for documentation "in an investigation into money-laundering and evasion in the transfer of players to Mexico. The raid on our headquarters is the product of an investigation that involves the representative of player Maximiliano Meza. He was transferred to Independiente in 2016. Later, the side from Avellaneda sold him to Mexico. During this operation, the current one Board of Directors was not yet in charge of the club," said Gimnasia y Esgrima in a statement about the raid.

Unión de Santa Fé also released a statement confirming the raid happened “in the framework of a case based in the town of San Isidro seeking accounting documentation from 2015 for a complaint made by PROCELAC before the Public Prosecutor's Office of the Nation." Meanwhile the document required was not in possession of the club as it has been collected by prosecutors in Santa Fe Province, as it was related to a previous search operation in 2019 related to a “criminal complaint for fraud carried out by three partners from the institution.”

See the former Brazilian player who was charged with money laundering