BOGOTÁ, Colombia (AP) — A team that played in a basketball tournament in Russia usurped the colors and name of the Colombian national team, the country’s basketball federation said Thursday [August 22]. The federation said it will take legal action “for the improper use of our image and logo” and that it never received a formal proposal to participate in the tournament in the Russian city of Perm. [emphasis added]
So since August I’ve been sitting here next to my fax machine waiting for it to scream and give me news that the Colombian Basketball Federation has taken the promised legal action against those who pretended to be the team in that tournament. I just realized I don’t have a fax machine and so what is this thing, anyway? Should it be humming? It’s not even plugged in. Anyway, I’m done waiting.
The CBF was upset because two games into the “Russian Friendship Cup,” an international basketball tournament in Perm, it became pretty clear that the Colombian national team was not, in fact, the Colombian national team. It was just some guys “wearing Colombia’s colors” but not in any way associated with the CBF.
While the uniforms were good enough to fool officials, the team’s performance was not. Proving it is possible to lose so badly that people start to question your identity, questions were raised after what was supposed to be the Colombian national team lost to “a local Perm squad” by more than 100 points (155–53). At least initially, though, some seemed to think that the answer to those questions was that the Colombian national team really sucked.
“After the first game,” said Andrei Kirilenko, a former NBA player who’s now president of a Russian boxing federation, “we understand [sic] that the current level of the Colombian team is lagging behind what was expected, which causes some disappointment for all of us.” Yes, I imagine the betting was heavily in favor of Colombia, given that its national team was supposed to be up against a Siberian pickup squad. If so, there was much disappointment for all.
But though suspicions were raised by the 102-point loss, they weren’t confirmed until after the Colombian team lost its second game, against Venezuela, by almost 50 points (107–58). Sure, that’s a lot better, but most people don’t seem to have been willing to give them credit for the improvement.
Also, other information had surfaced by then confirming the suspicion raised by the team’s ineptitude. In particular, the national federation had learned its national team was supposedly playing in an international tournament in Siberia, of all places, a tournament the federation knew nothing about. It seems to have learned about the matter, I guess unsurprisingly, when people started posting stories online about the “Colombian team” losing to “a local Perm squad” by an embarrassing 102 points.
“We became aware of [this] via social media,” said the president of the CBF. “We have no contact with the Russian Federation”—which is banned from international sporting events as a sanction for invading Ukraine—”but we heard about the lousy results of the alleged Colombian team and we became aware of the hoax [because our team wasn’t there].”
“We will conduct a thorough investigation,” el presidente continued, “as this affects the good name of Colombian basketball at the international level.”
That investigation and others allegedly revealed that the hoax was the brainchild of Cristian David Mosquera, a 25-year-old Colombian student who lives in Russia. Mosquera either hacked the CBF’s official email account or created a fake one (reports vary) that he used to convince the Russians he was a representative of the national team. He allegedly then managed to get the Russians (probably desperate to put together a tournament, given the sanctions) to pay all the team’s expenses, including flights from Bogotá, luxury hotels, and meals. The “team,” however, was allegedly just 11 of Mosquera’s pals and a guy posing as their coach. Mosquera himself wrangled a flight down from Kazan (where he was reportedly studying architecture) to join them when they arrived, and the rest is allegedly history.
According to this article from Infobae.com, apparently written by a Colombian reporter (or maybe a Russian posing as one, who knows), Mosquera and his friends have “a past in basketball.” The article says he was part of the team of the state of Valle del Cauca (la selección de baloncesto del departamento del Valle), but I don’t know whether this was a school team or part of the national framework. A picture from Facebook shows Mosquera shooting hoops as a younger man (together with a teammate I don’t see in the picture above). The article even names the other members of the pseudo-team.
Though their identities are evidently known, and have been for a while now, so far as I can tell the CBF has not followed through on its threat to take legal action. According to this source, it has asked the state prosecutor’s office to get involved, but I can’t find a report of any charges or a civil lawsuit actually being filed.
I am starting to have my doubts that the CBF will actually go through with this.
According to that source, “some experts” say the team members “could be sentenced to several years in prison for this type of crime,” but it provides no details. They may have defrauded the Russians, but why would Colombia prosecute its own citizens for that when Russia isn’t supposed to be having international tournaments anyway? Unless it’s a crime to misuse the national team’s colors or logo, and I guess it could be, they didn’t do anything to Colombia.
Except potentially giving people the impression that Colombia sucks at basketball. But that’s not a crime, and it’s hard to see what the CBF’s damages would be in a civil lawsuit. It’s not like Colombia had to pay for the trip. And, today, anyone who knows about the 102-point loss likely also knows that it wasn’t the real national team. No harm, no foul?
