Whilst Leeds fans think that they have worries what with Massimo Cellino and his ever changing whims, spare a thought for Leyton Orient fans and the issues that they could be facing, according to BBC Sport, with their president Fracesco Becchetti.
According to BBCSport, and other media outlets, Leyton Orient’s president Becchetti could face the distinct possibility surrendering to an arrest warrant, issued in June of this year, and then the extradition to Albania. The Mail Online say that the Italian, who had bought Leyton Orient in 2014 and also a satellite television station in Albania, is accused in the warrant of suspicion of money laundering. The Mail Online say that the charges stem from a project to build a power station in southern Albania where his company, KGE, contracted another company called Energji, which was controlled by his mother Lilliana Condomitti. Prosecutors allege that Energji inflated the price of works billed to KGE, the power station itself is still to be built. The prosecutors, according to the Mail Online, themselves say that they have sufficient evidence with which to charge Becchetti and all concerned with “collusion in forging documents more than once” and also with “laundering money from criminal deeds.”
Becchetti, at the time the arrest warrant was issued in June of this year, refuted the basis behind the warrant with the club website, quoted in the Newham Recorder, saying, “The allegations which have given rise to these Court orders are groundless and politically and improperly motivated. Mr Becchetti is currently involved in complex commercial litigation against the Republic of Albania, in which large sums of money are at stake…Mr Becchetti will vigorously contest the baseless accusations against him at the appropriate time.”
Becchetti’s next hearing is scheduled for Westminster Magistrates’ Court on December 7 with the fuller, more substantive hearing not expected to take place until some time next year. Until then, and with Becchetti having handed over his travel documents to British authorities, a statement released on his behalf said that the accusations will not affect his duties to the club with the Mail Online saying, “the Albanian requests should have no impact on his duties and responsibilities as Chairman of Leyton Orient.”
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