Spanish Court Slaps Hefty Fine On Prisa In Old TV Rights Dispute

A Spanish court has ruled that the Prisa group must pay €51 million to Mediapro for damages in a long-running dispute over Spanish football rights.

The Audiencia Provincial de Madrid said Prisa, former owner of Canal Plus, acted illegally in blocking Mediapro’s access to the signals of matches for free-TV and international distribution in 2007.

Prisa, which owns leading daily newspaper El País, was in a contractual dispute with  Mediapro at the time.

In a statement, Mediapro said: “The sentence reconfirms the good name of Mediapro in what became known as ‘the football war’ and the illegality of Prisa’s claims, which, after almost ten years of litigation, have been penalised by the Courts time and time again.”