Former Real Madrid manager Jose Mourinho has accepted a 12-month prison sentence over a tax fraud case stemming from payment irregularities during his time in Spain’s capital, though he will not spend any time in jail.
The Portuguese manager, who was head coach at Madrid from 2010 to 2013, reportedly evaded paying close to €3.3million in taxes on image rights over those three years.
Mourinho, the former Porto, Chelsea, and Inter Milan manager who was sacked by Manchester United in December, is not the first high-profile name to fall afoul of Spain’s tax authorities.
Cristiano Ronaldo and Lionel Messi have both previously been embroiled in similar tax disputes, as has former Madrid star Angel di Maria.
As the sentence is for less than two years, Mourinho is not obligated to serve any of his sentence according to Spanish law. The 56-year-old, one of only two Madrid managers to win La Liga this decade, had settled his case by agreeing to a deal with Spanish prosecutors last year, with that deal being formalised on Tuesday.
