Former head of the Brazilian Olympic Committee, Carlos Arthur Nuzman, has been sentenced to 30 years and 11 months in prison for bribing votes to host the 2016 Olympic Games. Reuters reports.
Nuzman, 79, who headed the Olympic Committee in Rio de Janeiro for 20 years, was found guilty of corruption, criminal organization, money laundering and tax evasion.
However, he will not face prison time until the appeal is heard.
Nuzman was first arrested in October 2017. He was accused of arranging more than $ 2 million in bribes in the 2009 vote when members of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) chose Rio de Janeiro as host of the 2016 Olympics.
The Criminal Court in Rio de Janeiro has also sentenced ex-governor of Rio de Janeiro Sergio Cabral, businessman Arthur Soares and former general director of operations for the Rio 2016 committee Leonardo Greiner to prison.
Cabral, who has been in prison since 2016 for a series of corruption scandals, was sentenced to a further 10 years. He had given the court details of the bribery conspiracy.
The International Olympic Committee, which removed Nuzman from his honorary membership following his arrest in 2017, said the ethics commission would examine the Brazilian court’s ruling.
