Imagina suspends US CEO after FBI raid

Spain’s Grupo Imagina is installing a new management team at Media World Sports, its US subsidiary company that was raided by the FBI last week.

It has put one of its key Spanish execs, Irantzu Díez Gamboa, in charge of the US operation following the raid at the sports rights company.

Imagina has suspended Media World CEO Roger Huguet, and another of its key execs, Fabio Tordin, both of whom, it transpires, had already pleaded guilty to fraud and other   offences relating to the Fifa investigation

The search of the Media World premises in Miami came amid the US law enforcement agency’s wider investigation into corruption at footballing governing body FIFA.

In the immediate aftermath of the raid, Imagina said it would “not tolerate any irregular or illegal activities or any activities, which might represent an infringement of the company’s code of ethics”.

None of the company staff are understood to have been charged, but Madrid-based Imagina has now said it will install a new management team.

Díez Gamboa has been appointed as general manager of Imagina US and steps into the new role today. Gamboa was previously the boss of Imagina’s Globomedia, Spain’s leading prodco and part of the Imagina group.

“The announcement follows the suspension of Roger Huguet, the chief executive officer of Media World Sports, and Fabio Tordin, a Media World Sports executive, following yesterday’s announcement by the US Department of Justice of the pair’s guilty pleas last month to conspiracy to commit wire and tax fraud and launder money in connection with the investigation of FIFA by the US,” the company said in a statement.

Imagina added that it will cooperate fully with the FBI in its ongoing investigation. “The group will do everything in its power to clarify the circumstances in which these events have taken place and assign whatsoever responsibilities are necessary for the actions of each of the individuals accused.”