[3][6] Hickey was re-elected president of the OCI for successive four-year terms, usually unopposed,[6] and defeating Richard Burrows of the Irish Sailing Association 27–10 in 2001.
[3][6] Nick Cohen, a reporter with The Guardian, criticised Hickey for flattering undemocratic leaders of potential hosts of the inaugural 2015 Games: Alexander Lukashenko of Belarus and Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan.
[13] Hickey was due to face trial in Brazil over his alleged role in the Olympic Council of Ireland (OCI) ticketing affair after a Rio de Janeiro judge accepted the charges made by a public prosecutor against him and nine others.
Public prosecutor Marcos Kac charged Hickey and nine others with ticket-touting, ambush marketing, theft, tax evasion, money-laundering and criminal association.
[15] But in November 2017, the Brazilian Supreme Court suspended the case against Hickey and the other accused, all of whom deny any wrongdoing, in order to examine the merits of the prosecution case and of the Habeas Corpus request by lawyers for one of his co-accused, Kevin Mallon of THG Sports, after the lawyers had argued that they could not mount a proper defence as the prosecution had presented no evidence, and "nor was there clarity on his alleged involvement in any crime".