BELLINZONA, Switzerland—Sepp Blatter and Michel Platini were acquitted on charges of defrauding FIFA by a Swiss criminal court on Friday, a rare positive outcome for the pair who were among soccer’s most powerful figures before being embroiled in corruption investigations.
The case was centered around a $2 million payment from FIFA to Platini with Blatter’s approval in 2011, for work done a decade earlier. The verdict followed an 11-day trial last month at the Federal Criminal Court of Switzerland in Bellinzona.
