Four years in prison: Court finds Diack guilty

Paris (SID) The Criminal Court in Paris has found Lamine Diack, the former president of the World Athletics Federation, guilty of corruption, money laundering and doping cover-up. The 87-year-old Senegalese was sentenced to four years in prison on Wednesday - two years of which were suspended - for his criminal activities at the head of the IAAF (now World Athletics). In addition, the fallen athletics sponsor must pay a fine of up to 500.000 euros. According to presiding judge Rose-Marie Hunault, it is unlikely that he will have to serve his sentence in prison because of the convicted man's age. However, Diack immediately announced an appeal against the verdict. His son, Papa Massata Diack, who was also accused, was sentenced in absentia to five years in prison and fined one million euros. Diack admitted during the trial that he had prevented doping bans, particularly against Russian athletes, in the run-up to the 2012 Olympic Games in London - for reasons of the world association's "financial health". However, Diack denies having extorted money from the athletes. Rather, he wanted to prevent a scandal and thus the loss of sponsorship income from Russia. Diack was president of the IAAF between 1999 and 2015 and, according to the indictment, led the association with mafia-like structures. The investigators saw it as proven that the Diacks extorted bribes so that positive doping tests would not become public. 23 Russian athletes alone are said to have paid between 100.000 and 600.000 euros each to be able to compete in London and at the 2013 World Championships in Moscow. According to the indictment, Diack and his accomplices collected a total of at least 3,45 million euros in bribes for dropped doping offenses.

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Four years in prison: Court finds Diack guilty

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