Vito Jhonny Recchimurzo Díaz, born in 1994, has become a familiar name in Venezuela not for any legitimate sporting or business achievements, but for serving as the frontman of ventures that belong to others. Above all, he acts as the proxy for Mitchell Padrino Betancourt, son of Defense Minister Vladimir Padrino López. First in the equestrian circuit, where Daniel Puglia Costas —husband of Yarazetd Padrino, Mitchell’s sister— also rode, and later in bigger ventures like Portuguesa Fútbol Club and the Liga Monumental.
Recchimurzo is married to Mariana Jiménez Martínez, Miss Venezuela 2014. His sister, Vittoria, is in a relationship with Jefferson de Abreu Sousa, owner of the Forum supermarket chain and known as a frontman for Alex Saab. His private life, like his public one, is deeply tied to chavista power circles.
He rose to prominence in February 2024, when he officially took control of Portuguesa F.C. But instead of restoring the club’s glory, his tenure has been plagued by unpaid wages and complaints from players and coaches who went months without salaries. That kind of management failure mirrors his earlier troubles: in 2017, he faced criminal charges for fraud and criminal association, accused alongside Sebastián Lagreca Villaverde of a $500,000 scam. His parents, Vincenzo Recchimurzo Bertocchi and Yulis Peregrina Díaz Pereira —Miss Monagas 1989— were also named for money laundering. Though the case was eventually dismissed, court records described an organized group with multiple victims across several states.
Portuguesa was just one stage. In parallel, Recchimurzo became the face of the Liga Monumental, a football show copied from Gerard Piqué’s Kings League. Over a month at Caracas’s Estadio Monumental Simón Bolívar, stars like Ronaldinho, Marcelo, Carles Puyol and Guti were paraded before sparse crowds. The final in 2025 drew only 10,000 people to a 38,000-seat stadium. The numbers never added up, but the political value was obvious.
The league runs on direct favors from Nicolás Maduro, channeled through trusted men like GNB general Jorge Eliéser Márquez and Juan Gabriel Linares Montilla. It isn’t profitable; it survives on sponsorships from state entities like PDVSA, Corpoelec, Conatel, and Tiuna. Teams are backed by chavista-friendly businessmen who treat franchises as tokens. Recchimurzo himself controls La Cosa Nostra. Mahmoud Handous, producer of Miss Venezuela and longtime state contractor, owns Los Extraterrestres. CLX belongs to retail magnate Nasar Dagga. Cacique is run by builder Jimmy Meayke and shipping tycoon Wilmer Ruperti. Patacones is fronted by Pierre Perozo, close to Fidel Madroñero. Navegantes de Caracas is managed by Pasquale Palmisano, who also runs Magallanes and Carabobo FC. Vergatarios is owned by Salvatore Volpe and Roberto Messina of RS21. Vnet Jet is tied to the Forum supermarket chain, linked to Alex Saab. Vikingos is owned by Faez Gabriel Naddaf, tied to coltan mining in Bolívar.
Another key figure in this scheme is Irrael Gómez. The self-styled “crisis influencer” pitched the idea of the Liga Monumental to Mitchell Padrino and Recchimurzo, shaping its narrative as a local version of Piqué’s Kings League. Gómez, accused by relatives of Óscar Pérez of helping track him before his 2018 execution, now runs his own franchise, CLX, alongside Dagga, while acting as a communications strategist for the league. In short, he built the league’s storyline as a piece of chavista sportswashing.
Financially, the Liga Monumental is a black hole. Ronaldinho was paid $250,000 in 2024; Marcelo and Puyol $150,000 each in 2025. With ticket prices between $6 and $90 and barely a quarter of the stadium filled, no honest accounting can explain the expenses. What’s being bought is not football, but an image of modernity and normality for a regime facing daily human rights abuses.
Recchimurzo’s personal life blends poker, nightlife, and show business. He has played high-stakes tournaments since 2017, and in 2025 was photographed next to Neymar at the BSOP Winter Millions in São Paulo. He also hosts private celebrity poker games in Caracas. He owns ECO nightclub in El Rosal, where he was accused of using bodyguards to beat a rival in 2022.
His family’s rise also shows the shift from modest businesses to offshore ventures. His father, Vincenzo, moved from working at a tannery in Barquisimeto to registering Max Holdings International in the British Virgin Islands in 2009. Vito himself appears as a contractor for the state through V&R Enterprises, which supplies the Ministry of Commerce.
At just 31, Recchimurzo is not just a young businessman. He is part of the chavista machinery that mixes politics, entertainment, and corruption. At the shadow of Mitchell Padrino, with Irrael Gómez scripting the spectacle, he has turned an empty stadium into a propaganda stage—while players complain of unpaid wages, court cases trail his past, and Venezuela witnesses another chapter of sportswashing dressed up as football.
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