The most senior American in the world's football governing body, Chuck Blazer, is now banned for life, FIFA's ethics committee announced Thursday, citing his involvement in widespread corruption, The Associated Press reports.

The announcement was but a formality after the former FIFA executive committee member pleaded guilty to racketeering and tax evasion charges back in May. As noted by the AP report, FIFA's ethics panel made its ruling using evidence from the American federal case, which led to the biggest scandal in FIFA history.

"Blazer was a key player in schemes involving the offer, acceptance, payment and receipt of undisclosed and illegal payments, bribes and kickbacks as well as other money-making schemes," the committee said in a statement.

Some of Blazers' transgressions include his admitted receipt of payments in a $10 million bribe scheme that supported South Africa's successful bid to host the 2010 World Cup; his involvement in World Cup ticket scams; and getting kickbacks from commercial deals he negotiated for the Gold Cup tournament while he was the CONCACAF (the regional football governing body for North and Central America and the Caribbean) general secretary. He served for 16 years on FIFA's policy-making executive committee, which has been chaired by FIFA president Sepp Blatter since 1998.

"I bear no responsibility for members of a government (the FIFA Executive Committee) I have not myself elected," Blatter wrote Thursday on his weekly column in FIFA's in-house weekly magazine. "I therefore also bear no responsibility whatsoever for the behavior of these ExCo members on their home turf."

As pointed out by the AP report, FIFA opened its ethics investigation of Blazer in 2012 after the financial management corruption of the CONCACAF was exposed. The proceedings were suspended the following year because of Blazer's poor health, and the development of the U.S. federal case.