Justice: Michel Platini & Joseph Blatter acquitted on appeal before the Swiss Criminal Court

The Extraordinary Appeals Chamber of the Swiss Criminal Court, which met in Muttenz (canton of Basel-Landschaft, Switzerland), acquitted Joseph Blatter (SUI, born 10/03/1936), former president of FIFA, and Michel Platini (FRA, born 21/06/1955), former president of UEFA, on 25/03/2025.

"My honour has been restored. The persecution of FIFA and some Swiss federal prosecutors for 10 years is now over," said Michel Platini.

The Swiss court was trying the two former executives from 03 to 06/03/2025 for "fraud", "disloyal management", "breach of trust" and "forgery of documents". They faced up to five years' imprisonment.

The court did not follow the prosecution's request, which on 04/03/2025 (as at first instance) had called for 20 months' suspended imprisonment for each of the defendants.

At the heart of this interminable affair (see detailed timeline below) was the payment to Michel Platini by FIFA of CHF2m (€1.54m at the time of the payment, on 01/02/2011): an amount paid "as compensation for my activities as advisor to the FIFA president - Joseph Blatter - between 1998-99 and 2001-02"…