Following his arrest by Brazilian authorities in connection with a ticket-scalping scandal, Patrick Hickey, has been moved to a maximum security prison. Hickey is the President of the Olympic Council of Ireland (OCI), and also a member of the executive board of the International Olympic Committee (IOC).
Hickey was initially arrested on Wednesday morning, as it was suspected that he was attempting to resell Olympic tickets at a much higher price than their face value. He was then brought to a hospital by Rio police as a precautionary measure, as he made complaints of health concerns.
After being discharged from the hospital, Hickey made an appeal for bail, which was denied by a Brazilian judge. He was then moved to Bangu maximum security prison.
Brazilian authorities have recommended multiple charges against Hickey and other executives involved in the scandal, including charges of illegal ticket resale, criminal association, and fraudulent marketing. As of now, prosecutors have not yet decided on the charges.
Since his arrest, Hickey has temporarily stepped aside from all of his Olympic-related responsibilities, but denied the claims that he was involved in the ticket-scalping scandal.
I don’t believe! It’s not possible. 71 years old president of the IOC selling tickets.. No way! Why he would take I risk of doing stupid crime, he is already very rich! It’s revenge for helping Russian athletes that he made them come to Rio.. Same happens to president of Fifa for choosing Moscow 2018 for World Cup. There is still no proves that Russian athletes had doping. Only bla bla bla… So many athletes was ban, I’m not even saying anything about para-Olipmic team. It’s awfull!
Brazil is determined to shakedown every foreigner before they leave. Worst. Olympics. Ever.
He must not be familiar with StubHub –
the only thing keeping me from being super upset about this is the ‘criminal association’ angle. that could be something like the dealer he was selling to has connections with local gangs, or it could be something like this guy is chumming around the clubs with gangsters which would mean a closer relationship that bears investigsting.
also, being an IOC operative also isn’t super sympathy enducing.
An Irish ticket resale company came forward and said that he was delivering the tickets to them. They are claiming to be the official ticket resaler in Ireland and say they are losing money because the tickets were confiscated. They charged face value plus a standard processing fee. If the store’s claim is true, then it’s just another Brazilian shakedown. They’ll charge him some ridiculous fine and let him go when they think they’ve gotten all they can out of him.
How Brazil paid for the Olympics…. Haha, just kidding.
But I shared the sentiment somewhat that the police go overboard to prove there is law and order in Brazil, but ignore the fact that there are real robbery case they should be working on. It said something about the system when so many robbery were reported by news media but no one report to the police. Again, Lochte’s case would not have gone so far if they didn’t report to police (who’s suggestion was that). Note the gas station never called police for the damage but have their own security to settle things. I don’t know how much it would cause to cover the damage, but if the guard demand… Read more »
they got $50 usd out of them.
How do you say “meet Bubba” in portugese? This guys fine is going to be a lot more than $11,000.
I get it, he broke a law but Maximum security prison for this? Maybe Brasil ought to put this Irish fellow in charge of filling the empty stadiums. At least he’s making an effort to put bums in some of the chairs.
Promote it like a Conor McGregor fight and those seats will fill quickly.
The Brazilians are probably holding Hickey hostage to insure that the IOC hands out a suitable punishment to Lochte.