The German Football Association was fined for tax evasion

A Frankfurt court has fined the German Football Association (DFB) €110,000 (about $128,000) for tax evasion related to the 2006 World Cup. Judge Eva-Marie Distler of the Frankfurt District Court stated that the DFB had demonstrated a "high degree of criminal intent," but rejected the prosecution's request for a €270,000 fine. "In the eyes of the court, there is no doubt that the DFB evaded taxes," she added, noting that the DFB "left a disastrous impression" in the way it reassessed the case. The case stems from the transfer of €6.7 million by the DFB via FIFA to the late French businessman Robert Louis-Dreyfus in 2005. The DFB justified the transfer as a celebratory event for the World Cup, but the event never took place. The federation recorded this amount as an operating expense in 2006, raising suspicions from the public prosecutor, who believed it led to a tax evasion of €2.7 million. For his part, the federation's lawyer, Jan-Olaf Leissner, stated that the amount represented a "hidden payment," but it still fell under business expenses, which, in his opinion, negated the existence of tax evasion. The case also involved three former senior federation officials: Theo Zwanziger, Wolfgang Niersbach, and Horst Arschmidt. The charges against them were dropped after they made payments to charitable foundations, given the difficulty of determining their exact responsibilities in the case, despite their continued denial of any tax violations.