A Barcelona court has sentenced Barcelona forward Lionel Messi, and his father, Jorge Horacio Messi, to 21 months in prison for tax fraud -- although neither will serve any jail time, according to a report.
The court has been hearing a case brought by prosecutors who maintain that Messi and his father, Jorge, used tax havens in Belize and Uruguay, and shell companies in the UK and Switzerland, to avoid paying taxes totalling €4.1 million on earnings from image rights between 2007 to 2009.
The prosecutors have called for jail sentences for both accused -- and according to Catalan paper El Periodico -- the court has decided to hand out such a punishment.