More than six years after Hernan Lopez was indicted by federal prosecutors for allegedly participating in a scheme to bribe FIFA soccer officials, a court has dismissed the case.
Lopez, former head of Fox International Channels, was convicted in the case in 2023 along with sports marketing firm Full Play Group. In September of that year, Judge Pamela Chen of the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of New York granted Lopez’s motion for acquittal and also overturned the conviction of Full Play. Last summer, a federal appeals court overturned Chen’s decision and reinstated the convictions — before the Justice Department in December 2025 filed a motion to dismiss the case “in the interests of justice.”
Lopez had long maintained his innocence in the matter. On May 27, Chen formally granted the DOJ’s motion to dismiss the indictments against Lopez and Full Play Group with prejudice (meaning the charges against them cannot be brought again), according to court documents.
In April 2020, federal prosecutors had indicted Lopez along with another former 21st Century Fox executive, Carlos Martinez, alleging they were part of a conspiracy to pay millions of dollars annually to FIFA officials in South America between 2000-2015 in exchange for broadcasting rights to the Copa Libertadores club tournament as well as confidential bidding information for U.S. broadcast rights to the 2018 and 2022 World Cup tournaments. (A Brooklyn jury acquitted Martinez of the charges in 2023.)
After Lopez left Fox, in 2016 he founded podcast studio and network Wondery, which he sold to Amazon in a deal that closed in early 2021. Currently, Lopez is the founder of consulting and research firm Owl & Co., which he started in 2024.
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