Lawyers from Real Madrid, acting as private prosecutors in the "Negreira case," questioned Barcelona president Joan Laporta during a court hearing on December 12.
Lent.az reports with reference to foreign media that the "royal club's" lawyers asked Laporta about the reasons for the 800% increase in payments to Jose Maria Negreira, former vice-president of the Technical Committee of Referees (CTA), as well as Negreira's son's involvement in the preparation of reports on referees for "blaugrana," which were not made public. In addition, Real's lawyers were interested in why Barcelona did not show these payments to the tax authorities and why their original source was hidden.
It is worth recalling that in 2023, the "blaugrana" club faced bribery charges related to payments to Negreira. Negreira worked at the Royal Spanish Football Federation (RFEF). It is alleged that Barcelona paid him a total of approximately 8.4 million euros between 2001 and 2018.
According to the Catalan club's version, Negreira was hired as an external consultant to prepare technical reports related to refereeing. The former vice-president of the CTA denies receiving bribes to influence referees.