Rimini court acquits four over Greek Serie B betting fraud case

The Tribunal of Rimini has acquitted four defendants in a case arising from anomalous betting on a Greek Serie B football match. The court ruled that "il fatto non sussiste" and ordered the return of €313,000 in seized winnings.

The match between Apollon Larissa and Aiginiakos took place on 17 February 2019 and ended 3-2 to the home side after a comeback, at odds of 27 to 1. The bets were placed within combined systems with other events, a method the prosecution said was intended to evade the automatic alert systems of the betting shops. At one betting shop in the Rimini area, 191 bets were recorded on the same match.

Four betting shops in the province, two in Rimini and two in Riccione, blocked payment of the winning tickets and reported the matter to the Guardia di Finanza, the Monopoli di Stato and the Greek football federation.

Investigations by the Fiamme Gialle of the Rimini provincial command led to four people standing trial: a 38-year-old man from Brindisi resident in Rimini, two Albanian citizens resident in Riccione and a 57-year-old from Rimini. They were accused of artificially inflating winning percentages by placing bets at night as well. The prosecution initially alleged sporting fraud, claiming the defendants had contacted or approached players of the two Greek teams and offered money to alter the result; the allegation found no supporting evidence, and the public prosecutor asked for acquittal on that charge.

Seven months after the prosecutor's sentencing requests, which ranged from two years to two years and nine months for three of the four defendants, the judge rejected the prosecution case in full. The court also rejected claims for a further €110,000 in damages brought by the betting shops that had joined the proceedings as civil parties.