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Ireland's Olympic chief claims to be "innocent" amid ticket scam inquiry

Ireland's veteran Olympics chief insisted on Monday he was "completely innocent" of all charges related to an alleged ticket scam at the Rio Olympics.

Patrick Hickey, 24 June 2015
Patrick Hickey, 24 June 2015 Jack Guez / AFP
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Pat Hickey, the president of the Olympic Council of Ireland, was arrested in his hotel room on 17 August and is the highest-profile suspect in an alleged attempt to illegally sell tickets to last month's Rio Games for thousands of dollars.

Prosecutors have estimated the profits from the black market sales at 2.5 million euros.

Hickey spent time in Rio's Bangu maximum security prison before being released on health grounds. However, his passport has been retained and he remains in Brazil.

In a statement issued via a Dublin-based PR firm, Hickey proclaimed his innocence by saying: "I have just received formal notification from the Brazilian authorities of the charges laid against me. For clarity, I am not under house arrest as, like with so many things with this case, has been misreported by the media.

"I intend to face all the charges and to fight each and every one of them," the statement continued. "I am completely innocent of all such charges and I will also vigorously defend my good name and character that I have spent my lifetime building through voluntary service for numerous sporting bodies."

Hickey's lawyer Anne Marie James said last month that he has a "serious heart condition".

Meanwhile a separate government inquiry in Ireland is probing how Hickey and the OCI handled tickets allocated by the International Olympic Committee for the Rio Games, the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi and the 2012 London Games.

Hickey has stepped aside temporarily as president of both the OCI and the European Olympic Committees, as well as the decision-making executive board of the IOC.

Questions over the OCI's ticket allocation came to light with the arrest at the beginning of August of Kevin Mallon, an Irish director of British hospitality firm THG.
Police said they seized hundreds of tickets from Mallon, some of which had the OCI name on them. Mallon and Hickey are among 10 defendants facing charges from Brazilian authorities regarding the alleged ticket scam.

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