Pakistan players fail in sentences appeal

Pakistan cricketers Salman Butt and Mohammad Amir have lost their appeals against prison sentences they received for their part in a spot-fixing betting scam against England last year.

Former captain Butt, 27, was handed a 30-month term while teenager Amir was given a six-month sentence after they were found guilty of deliberately bowling no-balls in a Test match against England at London’s Lord’s stadium in 2010.

Amir did not stand trial after pleading guilty to the charge, while Butt – and a third player, Mohammad Asif, – were found guilty in court earlier this month.

Player convictions not the end of the corruption story

Mazhar Majeed, a London-based sports agent at the heart of the fixing scandal, was jailed for two years and eight months for his role in the affair.

Asif opted not to appeal against his one-year sentence, but Amir and Butt chose to take their case to the Court of Appeal in London.

However, a panel of three judges, led by Lord Chief Justice, Lord Judge, rejected a plea that Butt’s sentence was “manifestly excessive” and an argument that Amir should only have received a suspended sentence.

Lord Judge said in court: “What these players did was not simply a matter of breaking the rules of the game and therefore subject to internal discipline and regulation.

“It is also criminal conduct of a very serious kind which must be marked with a criminal sanction.”

Lord Judge added: “It was not set up on the spur of the moment and it was not the result of some temptation to which either appellant succumbed, in effect, on the spur of the moment.

“These three cricketers betrayed their team, they betrayed the country which they had the honor to represent and betrayed the sport that had given them their distinction – and of course betrayed all the very many followers of the game throughout the world.”