LONDON (AP) — Five low-ranked tennis players — four from Mexico and one from Guatemala — were suspended for corruption linked to a match-fixing syndicate in Belgium, the International Tennis Integrity Agency said Thursday.
The players are connected to the criminal case of Grigor Sargsyan, the leader of the syndicate, the ITIA said, and follow bans on seven Belgian players that were announced last week.
The players whose punishments were revealed Thursday include Alberto Rojas Maldonado, a Mexican banned from tennis for life and fined $250,000, the maximum allowed. Maldonado, ranked a career-best 992nd in 2015, committed 92 breaches "and played a pivotal role in the corruption of other players," according to the ITIA.