“For nearly five years, Bank Hapoalim employees used the U.S. financial system to launder tens of millions of dollars in bribe payments to corrupt soccer officials in multiple countries,” said Assistant Attorney General Brian A. Benczkowski of the Justice Department’s Criminal Division. “Today’s announcement demonstrates the department’s commitment to holding financial institutions to account when they knowingly facilitate corruption and other criminal conduct.”
“Today’s resolution marks another successful chapter in this district’s effort to hold accountable those corporations and individuals who participated in a bribery scheme that corrupted international soccer,” stated U.S. Attorney Richard P. Donoghue of the Eastern District of New York. “This office, along with our law enforcement partners, will continue to identify wrongdoers who manipulate international soccer in order to reap illicit profits and bring them to justice.”