CRANS-MONTANA, Switzerland -- The organizing president of the Alpine skiing world championships in Crans-Montana in February was suspended Wednesday as he awaits trial for fraud in his business.
The Swiss ski federation said Claude-Alain Schmidhalter also is provisionally suspended as a vice president from the governing body ahead of his court hearing Oct. 27.
"This decision follows the indictment of Claude-Alain Schmidhalter by the public prosecutor's office of Valais canton," Swiss Ski said in a statement, adding the criminal case is not related to the sport and that he retains the presumption of innocence.
Swiss daily Blick reported the ski official denies the allegation that he defrauded a former partner in their engineering firm of about 300,000 Swiss francs ($360,000).
Crans-Montana hosts the Alpine worlds from Feb. 1-14, just 13 months after a devastating fire at a bar in the resort popular with young people. It killed 41 people and injured 115. The bar owners and multiple public officials face charges arising from the incident.