ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – JULY 20: A FIFA logo is seen on the display of a TV camera prior to a press conference at the Extraordinary FIFA Executive Committee Meeting at the FIFA headquarters on July 20, 2015 in Zurich, Switzerland. (Photo by Philipp Schmidli/Getty Images)
SoccerBy Andrew Bucholtz on

Since the initial arrests of seven top FIFA officials at the five-star Baur au Lac hotel in Zurich, Switzerland in May, the FIFA corruption scandal has had plenty of ups, downs and politics, but perhaps nothing quite as visually stunning as the scenes of police pulling high-powered soccer executives out of their rooms and taking them to jail. Seven months later, we seem to have topped that, with a new wave of arrests Thursday morning expecting to lead to charges against more than a dozen people. Best of all, some of those were carried out at the exact same hotel, ahead of further FIFA meetings on reform measures. From The New York Times:

Swiss authorities began a new series of pre-dawn arrests Thursday in the broad investigation, led by United States officials, into corruption in international soccer. More than a dozen people were expected to be charged, law enforcement officials said, nearly doubling the size of an already huge case that has upended FIFA, soccer’s multibillion-dollar governing body.

At least some of the arrests took place at the same luxury hotel where other FIFA officials were arrested in May. Swiss police entered the hotel, the Baur au Lac, through a side door at 6 a.m. local time. A hotel manager told visitors in the lobby they had to leave the property because of “an extreme situation.”

The police were targeting current and former senior soccer officials on charges that include racketeering, money laundering and fraud, authorities said. The new charges were expected to hit South and Central American soccer leaders particularly hard, the officials said.

New York Times European sports correspondent Sam Borden was on the scene at the Baur au Lac in May, and he was there again Thursday morning. Here’s some of his play-by-play from the hotel:

What’s funny is some of these arrests could have potentially been avoided if officials stayed at less plush accommodations.

The full implications of these latest arrests will take some time to suss out, as we don’t know just who’s arrested yet (Borden reports that CONCACAF president Alfredo Hawit is one of the arrested figures, which is funny because he took over for Jeffrey Webb, who was arrested at the hotel in May) and what they’re charged with. Much more information is expected to come out Thursday, especially when the U.S. Justice Department unseals the latest round of indictments. What we know for now is that the FIFA corruption scandal, and the U.S. government’s interest in prosecuting it, appears to be far from over.

About Andrew Bucholtz

Andrew Bucholtz has been covering sports media for Awful Announcing since 2012. He is also a staff writer for The Comeback. His previous work includes time at Yahoo! Sports Canada and Black Press.

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