Eto’o pleads guilty for €3.88m tax fraud to avoid jail term

Former FC Barcelona footballer, Samuel Eto’o Fils and his former representative José María Mesalles have accepted this Monday the sentences of 22 months and one year in prison, respectively, after acknowledging having defrauded €3,872,621 from the Public Treasury, between 2006 and 2009.

In his statement in the Criminal Court number 11 of Barcelona, Eto’o has admitted the fraud but has blamed it, without citing him directly, to Mesalles, whom he has always defined as “a second father”.

“I recognize the facts and I am going to pay, but let it be known that I was a child then and that I always did what my father asked me to do,” said Samuel Eto’o.