March 15, 2021 - The Croatian Supreme Court has issued a final verdict, confirming prison sentences for the Mamić brothers, Damir Vrbanović, and tax collector Milan Pernar.

Namely, Zdravko Mamić was sentenced to six years and six months in prison. Zoran Mamić, who is preparing for the match against Tottenham on Thursday as the Dinamo coach, has had his sentence reduced by three months and will serve four years and eight months in prison.

Damir Vrbanović was given three years, and Pernar three years and two months, reduced from four years and two months. The verdict was overturned in only one part, which refers to the point where Zoran Mamić was charged with inciting the abuse of former tax collector Milan Pernar, for which a retrial was ordered.

Almost three years since the invalid verdict, it has now been passed and become final, which means that Zoran Mamić and Vrbanović should go to prison at some point soon. The situation is significantly more complicated with Zdravko Mamić, who fled to BiH in June 2018, because the country will not extradite him to Croatia. As an explanation, they stated that the criminal offense for which he was convicted in Croatia was not defined as a criminal offense in BiH.

In addition to being sentenced to 6 and a half years in prison, Zdravko Mamić must return HRK 52 million.

Zdravko Mamić was convicted on all counts of the indictment, and after the intervention of the Supreme Court, he was convicted on all counts except one.

Zoran Mamić and Milan Pernar were found guilty of reducing Mamić's tax liabilities and accepting bribes, and Zoran Mamić was also found guilty of giving bribes. Zdravko, Zoran Mamić, and Vrbanović are guilty of splitting the Dejan Lovren transfer and Zdravko Mamić for splitting the Luka Modrić transfer. 

You can read the verdict in detail on the official website of the Supreme Court. According to the verdict, Dinamo was damaged by HRK 80 million.

Part of the court statement transmitted below:

"The second defendant, the executive vice-president and board member of the football club, and the fourth defendant, the general manager, and a board member, in agreement with the third defendant, falsely claimed that one player was entitled to half of the club's transfer fee. The player forwarded the money to the third defendant, who repaid the loans given to him by the club.

They thus damaged the football club by HRK 35,840,396.14 and obtained a profit of HRK 25,894,262.83 for the third defendant.

The fourth event concerns the conviction of another defendant, the executive vice-president and a member of the football club's board, for negligence over the club's property interests. He knew when one player left the club in 2008 that there was no contract under which half of the transfer amount should go to the player and half to the club. He subsequently untruthfully made an annex on the division of the transfer amount between the club and the player into equal parts, which he antedated. He thus created an apparent basis for the division of money. The money was paid from the club's account to the player's account, who then handed the money over to the other defendant and according to his instructions to members of his family. Thus, the second defendant obtained HRK 52,037,4335.73 for himself and damaged the football club by HRK 80,030,927.25."

Source: GOL.hr, Index.hr

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On Thursday, the HNS Assembly was regularly held where the Executive Committee named the new Executive Director of the Croatian Football Federation. The director of Competition and Infrastructure, Marijan Kustić, succeeded Damir Vrbanović, whose mandate expired, reports Gol.hr on March 28, 2019. 

"I am grateful to President Šuker and the Executive Committee for the trust they have given me, and I will do my utmost to do my job well," said the new Executive Director who is now officially the second man in HNS.

When asked whether this was a significant change in the Federation, Kustić answered:

''I have my way of working, of evaluating myself.”

Davor Šuker also announced that a national stadium would certainly be built Blato, Zagreb. 

"Let everyone do their part of the job and I hope we will soon have a wonderful stadium, and the ideal location is Blato. We are going step by step, but are working on all factors together. We can also get the funds from Uefa and Fifa, we know the costs according to their standards,” Šuker emphasized.

The HNS president stressed that there has been a lot of talk about infrastructure lately, but now things have calmed down. 

“I talked a lot about infrastructure, and now things have calmed. The stadium will be built. We want to offer our guests at least the minimum we receive when we play away, as clubs and the national team,” he said.

He also added that HNS would help Hajduk around Poljud.

"Moving forward with the stadium in Zagreb means thinking about what we will do with Poljud; we want Osijek, Rijeka and Split to be satisfied with the new stadium. We will also help Poljud, and we will talk about the ways and the money."

Kustić also presented his take on the stadium. 

“Nothing is definite. There is still a lot in combination, as we are talking to Gorica and others. But the team will continue to play throughout Croatia, that's my attitude,” Kustić said. 

Hajduk representatives attended the HNS Assembly in Zagreb as passive observers. Hajduk was represented by sports director Saša Bjelanović and head of the Academy Krešimir Gojun, as President Marin Brbić had other business obligations, reports Dalmacija Danas.

The Hajduk representatives said they opposed the financial report and the amendments to the HNS statute, as well as the construction of the national stadium. Recall, the 2018 financial report revealed that from January 1, 2018, to December 31, 2018, the Croatian Football Federation achieved revenues of HRK 435.5 million and expenditures amounting to HRK 371.6 million, and achieved an excess revenue of over HRK 63.8 million. Excess revenue will be used in years when there is no final competition, or when the Federation achieves a deficit of revenue over expenditures.

"At this point, we think we are not rich enough to invest in such a thing. Hajduk is opposed to building a national stadium. Our position is that it is better to invest in camps and local infrastructure because there have been a lot of missed investments in the past, and we know who is paying for it,” they said. 

"To build a stadium that we would play at once a month or once every three months is completely pointless. I also think that we are not a rich nation that can afford a national stadium. There is no need for that. It would be better to build camps so that our kids have somewhere to play,” Hajduk concluded. 

To read more about sport in Croatia, follow TCN’s dedicated page. 

The Croatian Football Federation has authorized a man with a prison sentence to represent Croatia in front of the world. 

Zoran and Zdravko Mamić face the indictment for corruption; the Supreme Court has moved the trial to Osijek, granting the claim by Croatian State Prosecutor's Office for the Suppression of Organized Crime and Corruption