BT Group PLC (LSE:BT.A) is carrying out a review into claims that its sports arm made payments to Daniel Kinahan, an Irish gangster sanctioned by the US government.
The FTSE 100 group's BT Sport arm is looking into payments previously made for the broadcast rights to bouts involving heavyweight champion Tyson Fury.
Earlier this month the US State Department offered a bounty of US$5mln (£4mln) for information that leads to the arrest of Kinahan, saying his organised crime gang carried out narcotics trafficking, money laundering, firearms trafficking and murder.
Fury's US promoter Bob Arum said this month his company had paid “at least a million” in consultancy fees to Kinahan for four Fury fights, including two with Deontay Wilder.
While BT has no commercial link to Arum or his Top Rank company, the broadcaster is carrying out “increased due diligence” on their previous transactions involving Fury, according to reports in the Times and Daily Mail newspapers.
In a statement, BT Sport said: “We have always taken allegations of corruption seriously and for the last few years have gone even further to ensure we only deal with legitimate businesses in boxing. This includes taking additional specialist legal advice.”
Kinahan, despite being named in the Irish High Court four years ago as the head of a £1bn drugs and arms cartel, continued to run his sports management firm MTK Global in Dubai until last week.
After the US State Department’s sanctions announcement and Arum’s admission, BT and fellow boxing broadcaster Sky moved to review possible links.
While Sky has a deal with Top Rank, the company told media that payments were “for fights which Sky Sports had no involvement with and were not screened on Sky. Top Rank has confirmed that it has not made any payments to any of the sanctioned companies or individuals for fights broadcast by Sky Sports.”