Football Leaks founder’s information preceded probes.
Years after his leaks shook the foundations of European football, Rui Pinto is claiming vindication following Manchester City’s conviction for financial fair play breaches.
Pinto, whose leaks of private documents helped trigger investigations into Manchester City’s financial affairs, has spoken about the club’s recent conviction for breaching financial fair play rules in a statement sent to the Guardian and later posted on social media.
Calling the conviction a “historic decision for English football”, Pinto said the ruling vindicates the large repository of internal emails and financial records he leaked, material that helped trigger investigations by both Uefa and the Premier League.
According to Pinto, the findings show that Manchester City did not bend financial fair play regulations, but systematically undermined them through what he described as “structural manipulation and financial manoeuvring”, reducing the governing rules to a “mere formality”.
Manchester City maintain their innocence and are expected to appeal.
Among the material Pinto provided was information concerning Manchester City’s finances, which was passed to the German publication Der Spiegel and its partners in the European Investigative Collaborations network. The cache contained more than 70 million documents and contributed to a series of investigations and revelations that reached far beyond Manchester City.
Portuguese national Pinto was arrested in Budapest in 2019 as part of an investigation into alleged tried extortion and several cybercrimes.
Pinto spent around a year in pre-trial detention, from March 2019 to April 2020, before being released after reaching a cooperation agreement with the Portuguese authorities.