''[h=3]WORLD CUP ORGANISER FACES £100MILLION MONEY LAUNDERING CHARGE[/h]A former president of the Brazilian soccer federation is facing charges of money laundering after it was found nearly £100million had passed through his bank account ahead of last year's World Cup.
Ricardo Teixeira, a long-time powerful figure within football's world governing body FIFA, resigned from the CBF and as head of Brazil's 2014 World Cup organising committee in March 2012.
His two-decade-long spell in charge of Brazilian football was dogged by controversy and allegations of corruption, although Teixeira was never charged with any wrongdoing.
Last night, Brazil's Federal Police issued an arrest warrant for the 67-year-old, who no longer lives in the country, after a two year investigation into his global business dealings, according to reports.
While the charges are not part of the corruption scandal engulfing world football, the information collected by Brazilian federal investigators will be of interest to the FBI probe which led to the arrest in Switzerland of seven senior FIFA officials last week.
Warrant for his arrest: The former head of the Brazilian soccer federation Ricardo Teixeira (pictured with disgraced FIFA president Sepp Blatter in 2006) is facing charges of money laundering after it was found nearly £100million had passed through his bank account ahead of last year's World Cup
Teixeira's successor as president of the CBF federation, José Maria Marin, was arrested on Wednesday by Swiss police along with six other FIFA executives on indictments for corruption brought by U.S. authorities.
As well as money laundering, Teixeira was also facing charges of tax evasion, forgery and falsifying public documents.
Barcelona football club's ex-president, Sandro Rosell, a long time friend and associate of Teixeira, was also indicted for the crimes of falsifying public documents and concealment of information.
In a Federal Police report obtained by Brazil's news magazine Epoca, detectives found that Teixeira kept money in numerous bank accounts in foreign tax havens such as Monaco.
The report claims that the money handled by Teixeira, as well as his other millionaire properties in Brazil and abroad, 'do not match the wages he received as president of the CBF'.
It also alleges that Teixeira does not declare money kept in foreign bank accounts, feigned the purchase of shares using the name of a firm to 'move high amounts of money' and made 'real estate transactions as a facade' to hide money laundering operations.
Investigators found that, in 2009, while in charge of Brazil's World Cup preparations, he transferred £150,000 to buy a luxury apartment in Rio de Janeiro's Barra da Tijuca neighbourhood, whose actual market value was around more than £800,000.
It was found that the man who sold the property to Teixeira for a fraction of the price was businessman Claudio Abrahao, whose tourism firm, Grupo Aguia, was a supplier to the CBF.
Teixeira, the former son-in-law of long-time FIFA boss, Joao Havelange, was not available for comment.''
Patamu hapo!