Barcelona President Josep Maria Bartomeu has told judge Pablo Ruz that he was not involved in any of the contracts to sign Neymar, according to Marca.
The newspaper cites sources close to National Court hearing on Friday, which state that the supremo protested his innocence, alleging predecessor Sandro Rosell was responsible for negotiating the transfer.
Bartomeu went on to say that he assumed all the necessary paperwork to be legitimate upon his arrival in January last year and consequently signed them off.
The patron then handed the documents over to Barca’s tax consultants and gave them instructions to scan for any discrepancies, which led to a payment of €13.5m being made to the Treasury last November.
In response to the accusations of tax evasion, Bartomeu responded by claiming that such an offence would not have occured in the current tax year, therefore making him immune from any punishment.
The court hearing lasted approximately three hours and another date is expected to be scheduled before the end of February.
