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Richard Sydenham at Southwark Crown Court
October 11, 2011
A senior anti-corruption officer for the ICC told a court on Tuesday that his department had no evidence of any match-fixing carried out by the Australia team.
Alan Peacock, who has been with the ICC's anti-corruption and security unit since its inception in September 2000, was asked a question by Salman Butt's legal team as to whether he had evidence that Australia fix matches or parts of matches. "We have no evidence," he replied.
The line of questioning came from Butt's lawyers as they were seeking to discredit agent Mazhar Majeed, who is at the centre of spot-fixing allegations involving Butt and who claimed in secret recordings played in Southwark Crown Court that Australia are the biggest match-fixers and fix ten "brackets" a day. The claim caused an angry backlash in Australia overnight as players and officials leapt to the defence of the team.
That allegation by Majeed was one of several outlandish ones heard in court on Monday that included being "very good friends" with Hollywood actor Brad Pitt and tennis champion Roger Federer.
Ali Bajwa QC attacked the credibility of Majeed as Butt sat in the dock next to former team-mate Mohammed Asif.
Both face charges of conspiracy to cheat, and conspiracy to obtain and accept corrupt payments, following the Lord's Test in August last year when they allegedly conspired with Majeed, teenage fast bowler Mohammad Amir and other people unknown to bowl pre-determined no-balls. Butt and Asif deny the charges.
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