Manchester United manager Jose Mourinho has reached an out-of-court agreement with Spanish prosecutors over an alleged £2.9 million tax fraud, it has been reported.
The former Real Madrid boss is said to have admitted two charges of tax fraud and agreed to pay a £703,000 fine.
Prosecution sources said the agreement had been “sealed” and would be formalised in the next few weeks, according to the Spanish newspaper El Mundo.
Mourinho claimed it was “case closed” after he appeared before an investigating judge in Madrid last November and he had paid all his taxes – but court officials confirmed afterwards he was still being probed.
There was no immediate official comment early this morning from prosecutors, who are now expected to withdraw their complaint against Mourinho, or court officials.
Mourinho’s tax affairs were placed under new scrutiny just under a year ago.
Prosecutors alleged Mourinho owed the Spanish state almost £2.9 million in undeclared revenue relating to image rights in 2011 and 2012.
The allegations involved claims false information was given to Spain’s Tax Agency during a 2015 probe, prompting prosecutors to reopen a case that had been archived after Mourinho paid a six-figure fine.
Mourinho was summonsed to court following revelations by the European Investigative Collaborations Consortium which includes Spanish newspaper El Mundo, German newspaper Der Spiegel and the Sunday Times.
One of the claims is that the Spanish taxman was supplied with fictitious expenses to make it appear an offshore shell company Mourinho benefitted from was functioning as an active firm.
The 55-year-old played down any suggestion of wrongdoing after a brief behind-closed-doors hearing at Pozuelo de Alarcon Court of Investigation number four where an investigating judge has led the criminal probe against him.
He insisted he had left Spain four years earlier with the ‘information and conviction his tax situation was perfectly legal’ and regularised his situation a couple of years later after he was told to pay more cash following a tax probe.
He told reporters: “I answered, I didn’t contest it, I paid and I signed an official agreement with the state under which everything was definitively closed.”