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Cases · FIFA / Swiss Office of the Attorney General · 2015–2023

FIFA's President and Switzerland's Prosecutor: The Undocumented Meetings

From 2015, Switzerland's Office of the Attorney General ran a large set of criminal investigations into corruption in world football. During that time, Attorney General Michael Lauber held informal meetings with FIFA officials, including president Gianni Infantino, that were not recorded. In 2019, a Swiss court removed Lauber from FIFA-related cases over potential bias. In 2020, a federal court found he had made a false statement about a 2017 meeting, and he resigned. Special prosecutors later investigated Lauber, Infantino and others for possible criminal offenses, and in October 2023 they closed the case, finding the suspicions unfounded, while charging part of the costs to Lauber and a colleague for the missing records. The case asks how investigators and the powerful organizations they examine should keep their distance.

By Tanner Simkins, editor

Timeline

  1. Four informal meetings involving Lauber, prosecutors, FIFA representatives including Infantino, and a cantonal prosecutor; none is recorded.
  2. The Federal Criminal Court orders Lauber and two prosecutors to recuse themselves from a FIFA-related case.
  3. The statute of limitations expires in the Swiss case over a 2006 World Cup payment, with no verdict.
  4. The Federal Administrative Court finds Lauber made a false statement about a June 2017 meeting; he offers to resign.
  5. Special prosecutor Stefan Keller opens criminal proceedings against Infantino and seeks authority to prosecute Lauber.
  6. Lauber leaves office; parliament closes impeachment proceedings.
  7. The Federal Criminal Court removes Keller from the Infantino proceedings for bias; he resigns effective May 31.
  8. Parliament appoints two special prosecutors to investigate the meetings.
  9. The special prosecutors close the criminal proceedings against Lauber, Infantino and others.
  10. An appeals chamber confirms the acquittals of Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini; prosecutors later decline to appeal.

The ethical issues

  • Prosecutorial independence from powerful organizations.
  • Documentation and transparency in investigations.
  • Appearance of bias versus proven wrongdoing.
  • Candor toward oversight bodies.
  • FIFA's dual status as complainant and subject of scrutiny.

Stakeholders

StakeholderInterests & obligations
The Swiss Office of the Attorney GeneralPublic trust and effective prosecutions.
FIFA and its presidentCooperation with investigations and reputation.
Defendants in FIFA-related casesFair, unbiased proceedings.
Swiss oversight bodies and parliamentAccountability of prosecutors.
Football's stakeholders and the publicCredible anti-corruption enforcement.

The case

Switzerland’s Office of the Attorney General (OAG) had been investigating corruption cases involving FIFA since 2015, dating back to Sepp Blatter’s presidency. By 2019 it was pursuing 25 criminal investigations with 15 countries. FIFA was not charged and was cooperating as a complainant.[1] During that period, Attorney General Michael Lauber held informal meetings with FIFA representatives, including president Gianni Infantino, that were not recorded.[1][4] The case asks what distance a prosecutor must keep from a powerful organization that is both a party to and a subject of its investigations.

Background

FIFA is based in Zurich, and the OAG’s football cases included one concerning a CHF 10 million payment in April 2005 that the 2006 World Cup organizing committee sent to FIFA, declared as support for a gala that never took place. On the same day, the money went to a businessman as repayment of a loan.[7] The OAG opened that investigation on November 6, 2015, and charged four former German football association and FIFA officials in August 2019. The case against Franz Beckenbauer was separated on health grounds.[5][7] Another case concerned a CHF 2 million FIFA payment that Blatter approved for Michel Platini.[8]

Special prosecutors later identified four informal meetings, on July 8, 2015, March 22, 2016, April 22, 2016, and June 16, 2017, in Bern and Zurich. Participants varied and included Lauber and other prosecutors, FIFA representatives including Infantino, and a cantonal chief prosecutor.[4] Lauber admitted two undocumented meetings in 2016 and acknowledged a third, in 2017, after media reports. He rejected accusations of lying and called the criticism “conspiracy theories.”[1] He defended the meetings as logistically necessary given the scope of the cases.[7]

The rules and governance

The Federal Criminal Court found in June 2019 that Lauber and two deputies had violated procedural rules by failing to report and document three meetings with Infantino. It ordered them to recuse themselves from a FIFA-related investigation, on appeals by two defendants who argued the meetings created possible bias.[1]

The attorney general is overseen by a supervisory authority, the AS-MPC, and elected by parliament.[7][6] Parliament re-elected Lauber to a third term in September 2019, despite the controversy.[6] In March 2020, the AS-MPC disciplined him, cutting his salary by 8% for breaching “several of his professional obligations” and “acting disloyally.”[2][7] On appeal, the Federal Administrative Court found in July 2020 that he had made “implausible” statements about the June 2017 meeting, “intentionally made a false statement” to the watchdog and knowingly concealed the meeting.[2] The supervisory authority said the court had found that Lauber “intentionally told the untruth” when questioned on November 12, 2018, by deliberately concealing the third meeting with Infantino, a serious breach of his duties of office and loyalty. The court also found that he lacked “awareness of wrongdoing and insight.” It kept the salary cut, the heaviest sanction available under staff law, but reduced it from 8% to 5%.[10]

Expired and failed prosecutions

The 2006 World Cup trial opened in Bellinzona on March 9, 2020. On March 17, it was suspended because of the coronavirus pandemic, and the 15-year limitation period expired on April 27, 2020, without a verdict.[5][7] The court said procedural circumstances and pandemic restrictions, “not procedural defects at the Federal Criminal Court,” were to blame.[5] Switzerland’s justice minister said it would be wrong to blame the pandemic alone. Other experts spoke of “sloppiness” or pointed to Lauber’s meetings with Infantino.[7] Anti-corruption expert Mark Pieth said the outcome “could damage Switzerland’s reputation” and that Lauber should not be allowed to “sit out” his term.[6]

Resignation and the criminal investigation

Lauber offered to resign “in the interests of the institutions,” while insisting he had not lied.[2] Parliament’s judicial committee, which had opened impeachment proceedings in May 2020, accepted his departure on August 31, 2020, and closed the proceedings.[3] Infantino denied any wrongdoing.[2]

The first special prosecutor

The criminal investigation into the meetings got off to a false start. On June 29, 2020, the AS-MPC appointed Stefan Keller, president of the cantonal and administrative court of Obwalden, as special federal prosecutor to examine complaints against Lauber, Infantino and others.[11] On July 30, 2020, Keller said he had found “indications of criminal conduct” in connection with the meetings, namely possible abuse of public office, breach of official secrecy, assisting offenders and incitement to those acts. He applied to parliament’s committees for the authority required under Swiss law to prosecute Lauber, who as an official elected by the Federal Assembly needed that approval. At the same time he opened proceedings against Infantino and the cantonal chief prosecutor, who had no such immunity. He stressed that “the presumption of innocence applies” to all three.[11]

The investigation then turned against its investigator. On April 30, 2021, the Federal Criminal Court’s appeals chamber granted Infantino’s request to remove Keller. It found that Keller had created grounds for recusal through media releases issued between December 2020 and March 2021 and through a statement in a legal journal. It declined to declare his earlier investigative steps void.[12] Keller resigned with effect from May 31, 2021. He said the ruling was “not conclusively reasoned” and appeared “result-oriented and not reached with the necessary independence,” and he warned that the change would cost time before the limitation period ran out.[13] Infantino’s lawyers had repeatedly denied any wrongdoing and had questioned Keller’s impartiality.[13] In both the 2019 and 2021 rulings, the problem was a prosecutor’s conduct outside the formal record: unminuted meetings in one case, public statements in the other.[1][12]

Parliament appointed two special prosecutors in December 2021 to investigate the meetings for possible abuse of office, breach of official secrecy and related offenses.[4] Suspicion had arisen mainly from the missing records, participants’ accounts of the meetings and timing coincidences with steps in the FIFA cases.[4]

Aftermath

On October 19, 2023, the special prosecutors closed the proceedings against seven accused, including Lauber and Infantino. They said the suspicion that FIFA had used the prosecutor’s office for its own ends was not merely unproven but refuted. They found the first meeting unrelated to FIFA and the other three limited to general remarks about cooperation and FIFA’s status as a party.[4] Because the meetings were not documented, they charged one-seventh of the costs to Lauber and one-fourteenth to another prosecutor.[4]

The OAG’s flagship football case also ended without convictions. Blatter and Platini were acquitted in 2022. On March 25, 2025, an extraordinary appeals chamber confirmed the acquittals “in dubio pro reo,” finding that the evidence supported the claim that the CHF 2 million was residual salary.[8] In August 2025, prosecutors declined to appeal, making the acquittals final.[9]

The core dilemma

Prosecutors often need contact with parties in complex investigations. But unrecorded meetings with the head of an organization at the center of the cases created an appearance of bias that damaged the institution, even though criminal suspicions were later refuted. What standards should govern such contacts?

Competing values

  • Cooperation vs. independence.
  • Efficiency vs. documentation and transparency.
  • Presumption of innocence vs. public trust.
  • Personal loyalty vs. candor with oversight bodies.

Strongest arguments

Criticism of Lauber: unrecorded meetings and a false statement to oversight undermined trust and compromised cases, regardless of criminal outcome.

In his defense: FIFA was a complainant, and the special prosecutors found no improper agreements. Coordination meetings are common in complex investigations.

On Infantino and FIFA: they were cleared in the criminal investigation, but the episode raised questions about FIFA’s proximity to its investigators.

Applying the frameworks

Virtue ethics

A virtue lens focuses on the honesty and prudence expected of public prosecutors, and on the false statement found by the court.

Justice

A justice lens asks whether defendants received fair proceedings when prosecutors met privately with a party, and whether the outcomes were fair to all involved.

Kantian ethics

A Kantian lens asks whether a rule permitting undocumented meetings with interested parties could be universalized without destroying trust in prosecution.

Walk it through: the Simple Decision Model

  1. Spot the issue. You are a prosecutor asked to meet an organization’s leader. Stakeholders include defendants, the organization and the public. Less visible are future litigants. The codes are procedural rules.
  2. Gather facts. What is the purpose of the meeting? Beware convenience and informality.
  3. Test options. (a) Meet informally. (b) Meet with records and disclosure. (c) Decline and communicate through counsel.
  4. Check codes and law. Check documentation and recusal rules.
  5. Decide and document. Record the meeting fully.
  6. Communicate and follow up. Disclose to oversight when asked.

What’s settled and what’s contested

  • Settled: the meetings, the 2019 recusal, the 2020 court finding and resignation, and the 2023 closure.
  • Contested: the extent of damage to FIFA-related prosecutions; whether the closure fully answers the governance concerns.

Why this case matters

The episode shows how independence and documentation protect investigations into powerful sports organizations, and how their absence can undermine trust even without criminal wrongdoing.

Key terms

Conflict of interest
A situation where a person’s private interest could improperly influence a decision they make in an official role.
Institutional accountability
Structures that make a sport organization explain its decisions and face consequences: clear authority, transparency, appeals, independent oversight and enforcement.
Trust
The public’s belief that what they are watching is real. Integrity failures are ultimately failures of trust.
Due process
Fair procedures before a sanction: notice, a chance to respond, an impartial decision-maker and a right of appeal.
Corruption
The misuse of entrusted power for private gain, whether financial, sporting, administrative or cultural.

Definitions from the Ethics Cases glossary.

Discussion questions

  1. Is it ever appropriate for a prosecutor to meet privately with a party in an investigation? Under what conditions?
  2. The criminal case was closed, but Lauber was found to have made a false statement. How should we judge the episode?
  3. FIFA was a complainant in the Swiss cases. Does that justify meetings with prosecutors?
  4. What safeguards would you require for contacts between investigators and powerful organizations?

Sources

  1. Swiss court orders attorney general to recuse over FIFA probe — SWI swissinfo.ch
  2. Under-fire Swiss attorney general offers to step down — SWI swissinfo.ch
  3. Le procureur général de la Confédération Michael Lauber quittera ses fonctions au 31 août 2020 — Swiss Parliament
  4. Informelle Treffen: Einstellung der Strafverfahren gegen Michael Lauber, Gianni Infantino und weitere Beschuldigte (media release, 26 October 2023) — Extraordinary Federal Prosecutors of Switzerland
  5. Medienmitteilung: Verjährung im Strafverfahren betreffend Zahlungen im Vorfeld der Fussball-WM 2006 (Apr. 28, 2020) — Swiss Federal Criminal Court
  6. Expert slams Swiss prosecutor and criminal court (Apr. 27, 2020) — SWI swissinfo.ch
  7. Time runs out on 2006 World Cup affair trial — DW
  8. Blatter and Platini cleared in corruption case (Mar. 25, 2025) — SWI swissinfo.ch
  9. Swiss prosecutors decline appeal against ex-football supremos (Aug. 28, 2025) — SWI swissinfo.ch
  10. Bundesverwaltungsgericht bestätigt schwere Amtspflichtverletzung von Bundesanwalt Michael Lauber (July 24, 2020) — Supervisory Authority for the Office of the Attorney General (AB-BA), via admin.ch
  11. Application to lift the immunity of Attorney General Michael Lauber and commencement of criminal proceedings against Gianni Infantino (July 30, 2020) — Special Federal Public Prosecutor, via admin.ch
  12. Medienmitteilung: Ausstandsgesuch von Gianni Infantino gegen den a.o. Bundesanwalt gutgeheissen (May 5, 2021; decision BB.2020.296 of Apr. 30, 2021) — Swiss Federal Criminal Court
  13. Special prosecutor in FIFA case criticises his dismissal (May 20, 2021) — SWI swissinfo.ch