Bolivia soccer federation chief jailed in embezzlement case
Carlos Chavez, treasurer of the South American Soccer Confederation and the Bolivian soccer federation, looks out from behind bars at the jailhouse in Sucre, Bolivia, Tuesday, July 21, 2015. AP
LA PAZ, Bolivia—A Bolivian judge on Tuesday ordered the president of the country’s soccer federation jailed on charges he diverted funds from a charity match.
Judge Roberto Baldivieso sent Carlos Chavez, who is also treasurer of the South American Soccer Confederation, to Bolivia’s notorious Palmasola Prison in the eastern city of Santa Cruz.
He also ordered the federation’s executive secretary, Alberto Lozada, placed under house arrest in the same case.
Chavez and Lozado are accused of misappropriating some of the more than $400,000 in receipts from a 2013 friendly match between Bolivia and Brazil that were to have benefited the family of a fan, Kevin Beltran, killed by fireworks shot by Brazilian fans at an earlier game.
READ: Fifa to come under fresh scrutiny at US senate hearing
The father of the dead fan said in a TV interview that Chavez told reporters in 2013 that part of the money would go to the family. But Limbert Beltran said he had seen none of it.
The charges make no reference to the bribery scandal affecting FIFA, soccer’s international governing body. But chief Bolivian prosecutor Ramiro Guerrero did not rule out a broadening of the investigation.
Among 14 FIFA officials investigated by U.S. authorities on charges ranging from money laundering to fraud are four South Americans, two of them top officials in the South America federation.
