This archive report was first published on 18 June 2020.
On June 8, 2020, former President of the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF) Lamine Diack, 87, arrived at the Paris courthouse for his trial, where he faced a four-year jail sentence sought by French financial prosecutors for corruption and money laundering linked to a Russian doping scandal.
Prosecutors alleged that Diack and his son, Papa Massata Diack, were at the heart of a scheme that solicited bribes worth millions of euros from Russian athletes to cover up failed doping tests and allow them to continue competing.
Public prosecutor Arnaud de Laguiche stated, “It was corruption at all levels,” in closing remarks.
Prosecutors also alleged that Diack obtained $1.5 million of Russian funds while negotiating sponsorship and television rights to help finance Macky Sall’s campaign for the 2012 Senegal presidential election, in exchange for slowing anti-doping procedures.
Diack testified that he had not sought to protect the athletes, some of whom later participated in the London 2012 Olympics, but to ensure the cases did not come to public attention at once and cause a scandal.
He claimed that the finances of World Athletics, then called the International Association of Athletics Federations (IAAF), were at the time in bad shape and slowing the doping cases helped save a sponsorship deal with Russian bank VTB.
Prosecutors sought a five-year prison sentence for Papa Massata Diack, who fled France for his native Senegal after the French investigation began and was tried in absentia.
World Athletics sought 41.2 million euros in damages, with a lawyer stating, “They destroyed athletics’ honour. The big-time sponsors have gone. We had to jettison the IAAF brand.”
