In the many hours of audio recordings that United States prosecutors have on defendants in their world-soccer corruption case, Juan Ángel Napout, a FIFA executive arrested in December, speaks precious few words.

In Spanish, he offers a greeting in an elevator and discusses grabbing a coffee, but says little else.

On Tuesday, in a hearing in federal court in Brooklyn, lawyers for Mr. Napout, of Paraguay, were eager to fight the array of criminal conspiracy charges brought against him last year.

“I don’t think there’s much evidence in this case, which is why we’re insisting on going to trial,” John Pappalardo, a lawyer for Mr. Napout, told Judge Raymond J. Dearie of Federal District Court for the Eastern District of New York.