Former Geylang Utd goalie alleges abuse in S’pore jail
A former Singapore goalkeeper says that he had been physically abused while doing time in jail here.
German goalie Lutz Pfannenstiel, now 38, was sentenced to five months in jail for match-fixing while playing for Geylang United Football Club in 2001, having been charged with corruption alongside then-Sembawang Rangers defender Mirko Jurilj the year before.
Pfannenstiel served 101 days of his sentence in Queenstown Remand Prison, reported The New Paper on Tuesday.
In the years since his release and departure from Singapore, he told foreign media in interviews that he was not guilty of the crimes he was charged for, and also that he was nearly raped by other inmates and was interrogated like a “hardened criminal” by officers from the Corrupt Practices Investigation Bureau (CPIB).
A check by Yahoo! Singapore revealed that at least three foreign interviews done by Pfannenstiel mentioned his jail time here, all reporting his insistence of his innocence, with him saying in one interview that “everybody who looks at the facts knows (he) was set up”.
He also told sports web portal Bleacher Report that he had not been found guilty, and in a particularly revealing interview with UK football magazine Four Four Two, he shared more details of his imprisonment.
These included alleging that his nose had been broken at least twice from physical abuse by prison inmates, and that CPIB officers slapped him and interrogated him over 48 hours, leaving him naked in a cold cell.
When contacted, CPIB and the Singapore Prison Service strongly refuted the allegations Pfannenstiel made, calling them “baseless and unfounded”.
A CPIB spokesperson said that its officers “had conducted themselves fairly and professionally” during its investigations into the case.
The Singapore Prison Service added that throughout Pfannenstiel’s time served in prison, he had never lodged complaints with the authorities, despite numerous opportunities to do so.
“Mr Pfannenstiel, like all inmates, was checked daily by our officers, and any sign of injuries would have been noticed and referred to our doctors,” its spokesperson said, explaining that his medical records did not reflect any such injuries, much less a broken nose.
Speaking to The New Paper last week, Pfannenstiel reiterated his claim to innocence and explained how the charges a decade ago may have come about.
He said that a man had approached him at a petrol kiosk and asked him how Geylang United would fare in their next match.
“I didn’t know he was a bookie, and when anybody asks if we were going to win, I would say we would. Geylang was a good team. We normally win,” he said.
He also maintained what he said about his experiences in jail here, although adding that he has since moved on from it.
“The time I spent in prison was so tough that it completely changed me,” he said. “I had always enjoyed my life as a football player… but (while in prison) a lot of things became more important to me.”
Pfannenstiel went on to play in numerous other teams in New Zealand, Europe and Canada after leaving Singapore, and is internationally known as the only footballer in history to have played more than 400 games on all six inhabited continents — and he plans to stage a match in the seventh, Antartica, in 2014 — for 28 different teams.
He founded Global United Football Club in 2008, with which he organises celebrity football matches to spread awareness about climate change. Under the club, he and other international players worked with US-based The Sanneh Foundation to provide assistance to families afflicted by the Pakistan floods last year.
