'Football Leaks' hacker verdict delayed in anticipation of amnesty
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The judgment had been scheduled for Thursday, but the Lisbon court announced that it will wait until July 31 to see if Pinto is pardoned.
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Rui Pinto escorted by judicial officers as he arrives at the Metropolitan Court in Budapest, Hungary, in January 2020 (AFP)
The verdict in the trial of the "Football Leaks" hacker Rui Pinto was on Tuesday postponed due to an anticipated amnesty for young offenders to celebrate a papal visit to Portugal.
The judgment had been scheduled for Thursday, but the Lisbon court announced it will wait until July 31 to see if Pinto is pardoned.
Pope Francis is due to visit Lisbon from August 1-6 for a series of events tied to World Youth Day on August 2. The Portuguese government has announced its intention to grant an amnesty for certain offenses committed by people aged between 16 and 30.
Pinto is 34 but began publishing hacked documents on the internet at the end of 2015. He is being tried for 89 hacking offenses whose victims included top Portuguese football club Sporting, investment fund Doyen Sports, the Portuguese Football Federation, a law firm, and magistrates of the Portuguese Public Prosecutor's Office.
The prosecution argued that Pinto tried to blackmail Nelio Lucas, the boss of Doyen, which is based in Malta and controlled by a family of Kazakh-Turkish oligarchs, by demanding between 500,000 and one million euros to stop him from publishing compromising documents on the Internet. Pinto confessed to hacking and regretted his behavior toward Doyen Sports
The documents unveiled by "Football Leaks" since the end of 2015 have brought to light dubious football business practices involving famous players and clubs, leading to tax adjustments and the opening of legal proceedings in several European countries.
He is also charged with attempted extortion, a crime punishable by between two and 10 years in prison. An amnesty might not end his legal problems.
The Portuguese Public Prosecutor's Office confirmed on Tuesday that it had drawn up a new indictment against Pinto, charging him with 377 new computer crimes that he is alleged to have committed between 2016 and 2019 against some 70 people, companies, or institutions.
According to the Portuguese press, the targets of these intrusions were Portuguese clubs, including Benfica, as well as several companies, judges, prosecutors, and the tax authorities.
Pinto's lawyers responded by accusing the Portuguese justice system of artificially separating these cases in order to wage "an interminable legal battle" against their client.
Pinto spent more than a year in pre-trial detention following his arrest in Hungary in January 2019 before agreeing to cooperate with authorities in other cases, becoming both a defendant and a protected witness.
