Athletics: Lamine Diack's trial scheduled for June 8

Text by: Farid Achache Follow

The start of the trial of the former boss of the International Athletics Federation (World Athletics, ex-IAAF) Lamine Diack, his son Papa Massata and four other actors in a doping corruption case in Russia, has was postponed from June 3 to 8 before the 32nd correctional chamber of the Paris court.

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Lamine Diack, 86, former boss of the international athletics federation (World Athletics, ex-IAAF), four terms on the clock from 1999 to 2015, must answer for active and passive corruption, breach of trust and laundering in organized gangs. Among the other defendants is his son and former "special advisor" for marketing at the IAAF, Papa Massata Diack, also called PMD, a refugee in Dakar since the arrest of his father in November 2015, and who has always escaped French justice, despite the issuance of an international arrest warrant.

Lamine Diack still under house arrest in France

The trial of Lamine Diack, her son and four other actors was delayed from June 3 to 8. The trial before the 32nd correctional chamber of the Paris court will take place over six days, June 8, 10, 11, 15, 17 and 18.

During the trial, Lamine Diack must also be tried for allowing her son to appropriate large sums in negotiations with the sponsors, either by taxing his companies as intermediaries, or by taking juicy commissions. Former French long jump champion, Lamine Diack has been under house arrest in Essonne, in the Paris region, since his indictment in November 2015.

Another former advisor to Lamine Diack, lawyer Habib Cisse, former head of the IAAF anti-doping service, Gabriel Dollé, former president of the Russian Athletics Federation, Valentin Balakhnichev, and former national cross-country trainer in Russia, Alexei Melnikov. All are suspected of having participated in a system of corruption from 2011 allowing doped Russian athletes to escape, at least for a time, from any disciplinary sanction in exchange for bribes.

Trial adjourned last January

The trial started on January 13, but was immediately dismissed for procedural problems. On the one hand, documents claimed by French justice in Senegal had arrived at the last moment on the judges' desk. On the other hand, Papa Massata Diack, absent at the hearing but represented by his lawyers, had been sent to court for an offense, the concealment of breach of trust, which was not included in his international arrest warrant.

A new order for reference to court was therefore signed on 22 May by the investigating judge Bénédicte de Perthuis, who succeeded Renaud van Ruymbeke, who had retired on this file. In this ordinance, the magistrates in charge of the investigation estimate that “  Papa Massata Diack could only be enriched in considerable proportions to the prejudice of the IAAF with the constant and enlightened support of his father who cannot leave the sole responsibility for it to his son, a consultant introduced and mandated by him  ”.

Lamine Diack needed the money, he told judge Van Ruymbeke. It was to beat the president of Senegal Abdoulaye Wade, during the presidential and legislative elections in 2012. He needed funds to finance the campaign of the Senegalese opponent Macky Sall, the current head of state .

A case that dates back to 2014

The case started in 2014, when the agent of a Russian marathon runner, Lilya Shobukhova, revealed to an IAAF employee that her client had to pay 450,000 euros to the Russian Athletics Federation for not appear on a list of athletes suspected of doping.

The National Financial Prosecutor's Office (PNF) was seized in August 2015. He decided to open a judicial inquiry in October 2015. The three investigating magistrates, including the former anti-terrorist judge Renaud Van Ruymbeke, realize that the case can actually be divided into two parts. First, funds were allegedly diverted from the IAAF by Lamine Diack in favor of Papa Massata Diack. On the other hand, disciplinary proceedings against 23 Russian athletes suspected of doping were allegedly delayed in order to allow them to participate in competitions in exchange for bribes. Lamine and Papa Massata Diack face ten years in prison.

After this trial, Lamine Diack, former Senegalese politician, secretary of state for youth and sports in 1969, mayor of Dakar in 1978, vice-president of the National Assembly in 1993, will not be done with justice French. He is also under investigation in another corruption case, still under investigation, related to the attribution of the Olympic Games in Rio and Tokyo , and the World Athletics from 2013 to 2021.

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