Former FIFA official commits suicide as corruption trial kicks off

A former Argentine lawyer for a government-run soccer television program ran in front of a Buenos Aires train and committed suicide late on Tuesday, November 15, 2017, hours after being accused in a New York court of receiving bribes.

Jorge Delhon, 52, appears to have committed suicide after another businessman, Alejandro Burzaco, accused him during testimony of taking $2 million in bribes, reports the BBC. Delhon, who is the attorney for the Argentine government’s Football For All scheme, was alleged to have accepted $500,000 per year from 2011-2014 to secure the broadcasting rights to international football games.

"We paid bribe at Torneos to two officials that were running the Futbol Para Todos program," Burzaco, former chief executive officer of sports marketing company Torneos y Competencias, said as he took the stand against former FIFA bigwigs Manuel Burga, Jose Maria Marin and Juan Angel Napout during the second day of a Fifa corruption trial that began in New York this week.

Burzaco identified Delhon as the contracted lawyer for Football for all. Shortly after the trial, Delhon was found dead on rail tracks in the Lanus suburb of Buenos Aires after running in front of a train on the same day he was accused in court. 

The driver of the train told police a man later identified as Delhon ran along the tracks in Lanus, Buenos Aires, the local police department said in a statement that called the death a suicide. The driver honked and tried to brake, but the man was run over, the statement said.