The multifaceted life of Uli Hoeness

A majority of Bayern Munich members who attended the club's annual general meeting on Friday voted in favor of making Uli Hoeness president for a second time. He was the only candidate after current President Karl Hopfner agreed earlier this year not to run for re-election.

On February 29, 2016, Uli Hoeness was released after serving just half of his three-and-a-half-year sentence for tax evasion. He somehow managed to slip away from at Landsberg prison near Munich unnoticed by the waiting media.

On March 13, 2014 Hoeness was convicted of evading 28.5 million euros ($30 million) in taxes and sentenced to three-and-a-half years in jail. Prosecutors had asked the court for a sentence of five years and six months. One day later, Hoeness resigned as president of Bayern Munich - with immediate effect. He began serving his sentence on June 2, 2014.

This statement, which Hoeness made at an extraordinary general meeting of Bayern Munich on May 2, 2014, was interpreted as a signal that he intended to return to the club after serving his sentence. Here he is seen with Bayern's former sporting director and the chairman, Karl-Heinz Rummenigge.

Alongside Gerd Müller, Uli Hoeness was once part of the most prolific strike force in Europe, but at just 27, he was forced to end his playing career due to injury. Hoeness was part of the Bayern team that won both the Bundesliga and the European Cup three times. He was also part of a West German national team that won both the European championship (1972) and the World Cup (1974).

In 2013, Bayern Munich won the treble; the Bundesliga title, the German Cup, and the Champions League. "An unbelieveable year," said the club's president, who was still a free man, despite the fact that a warrant for his arrest on tax-evasion charges had already been issued.

The peak of Hoeness' career in football was followed by the lowest point of his personal life. At Bayern Munich's annual general meeting on November 13, 2013, the club's membership applauded their president, who was moved to tears. He ruled out resigning from his post.

Hoeness was always there with a helping hand for a friend in need. Clubs like St. Pauli and even rivals Borussia Dortmund have been known to profit from his generosity. He also reached out to help former teammates like Gerd Müller, who struggled with alcohol, or players like Sebastian Deisler who suffered from burnout and Dietmar Hamman, who was stricken by alcohol abuse and compulsive gambling.

Politicians like German Chancellor Angela Merkel used to like to be seen with Uli Hoeness, but since his conviction on tax evasion, there has been a chill in their relationship. Merkel has said that she has a tremendous amount of respect for Uli Hoeness' charity work, but that this had been tarnished by a "sad facet" of his character.

In sporting terms, Uli Hoeness can do more than just kick a football, he also has a passion for golf. The former striker likes nothing more than to play a round at the course near the Tegernsee lake, around 50 kilometers (30 miles) south of Munich. And who knows; maybe even the odd player transfer has come together over a round of golf.

For the most part, Uli Hoeness keeps his private life to himself. He has been married to his wife Susanne for 40 years and his two children, Sabine and Florian are grown up. Hoeness is said to have had a bit of trouble convincing his wife "Susi" to let him go back to being Bayern president. He has promised that this time, he won't be at the office 24/7.

Hoeness, the son of a master butcher, started up the HoWe sausage-making company in Nuremberg in 1985, and it now supplies major businesses such as Aldi or McDonalds. HoWe, which is where Hoeness made a lot of his money, has been taken over by his son Florian.

On February 17, 1982, Uli Hoeness was the sole survivor of the crash of a private jet, while he was on his way to a West German national team friendly. The three other people on board the plane died. Hoeness, who was asleep on the back seat of the plane when it crashed, remembers nothing about it.

A feud with former Bundesliga coach Christoph Daum (second from left) began when both appeared on a sports talk show in 1989. The feud reached its climax in a cocaine scandal surrounding the then-designated national team coach Daum in 2000. Daum never took up the post, after a test on his hair turned up positive for cocaine.

Hoeness' tax-evasion conviction made him an easy target for jokesters. This float at the 2014 Carnival parade in Mainz portrayed Hoeness as a fool who scored an own goal by turning himself in to the tax athorities.