Five stables at the centre of a mysterious breast cancer drug case have escaped with modest fines after no one was able to prove the source of their positive tests.
The Victorian Racing Tribunal handed down penalties in the case on Monday morning, conceding that “there’s no evidence before the tribunal that the trainers had been directly culpable” for their horses testing positive to formestane and its metabolite 4-hydroxytestosterone.
Formestane is a prohibited substance used to treat breast cancer overseas. It is not permitted for use or importation in Australia. If administered, it can be viewed as an anabolic-androgenic steroid.
Five horses from five different stables tested positive to formestane and 4-hydroxytestosterone after racing at different race tracks on different dates between February 22, 2023 and April 13, 2023.
On Monday, the tribunal fined trainers Smiley Chan, Julius Sandhu and training partnership Amy and Ash Yargi $4000 each for presentation (a horse testing positive on race day), with $2000 of their fines suspended for 12 months.
Fellow trainers Symon Wilde and father and son combination Mark and Levi Kavanagh were fined $6000 each on the same charge because of their prior records – with $3000 suspended for 12 months.
Tribunal chairman Magistrate Peter Reardon said neither the trainers nor Racing Victoria were able to prove the origins of the substance.
“The trainers were unable to explain to stewards what caused the positive findings, and they had never heard of the substance,” Reardon said when handing down the tribunal’s decision.
“It’s worth noting that neither had some of the veterinarians.
“There was no incriminating evidence located in the stables or elsewhere. The level of the prohibited substance found in each horse was very low.”
Reardon said the tribunal could not make a “definitive determination of how these horses had the substances in their respective systems”.
He said despite the unusual nature of the case, financial penalties were appropriate at a “significantly reduced” rate.
“The tribunal should not be seen to condone the presence of prohibited substances in horses on a race day,” he said.
Reardon said that while the World Anti-Doping Agency had no part to play in this case, he noted that it had introduced formestane thresholds for athletes. Formestane can occur naturally in humans.
“With no threshold level for this substance found in a horse, presentation offences have been committed,” he said.
“But the levels found in each horse are so low it is doubtful it would have any effect on the performance of each horse – either illegal performance enhancement or a negative impact.”
The trainers initially pleaded not guilty to the charges, but after a contested hearing lasting five days in December last year they agreed to change their pleas to guilty after reaching an agreement with Racing Victoria.
As part of the agreed facts, the trainers said they would not seek to establish that the substances – formestane and 4-hydroxytestosterone – were produced naturally in horses (an endogenous origin).
And Racing Victoria agreed it would not seek to establish the substances were administered to the horses (an exogenous origin).
Racing Victoria also agreed it did not have evidence to contradict what the trainers told stewards.
Under the rules of racing, presentation offences are strict liability offences. There is no requirement from Racing Victoria to demonstrate how the substance came to be in the horse. It just has to prove it is present.
But for three years, since the positive urine samples were first recorded by Racing Analytical Services Limited (RASL), the trainers have denied any knowledge of where the substances came from.
Their legal counsel, Damian Sheales, argued that formestane and 4-hydroxytestosterone could occur naturally in horses, as it does in humans. He said it was “impossible to discount”.
Sheales said it was a unique case because the cause of the positives could not be established.
He said it could not be inferred that the trainers did anything wrong, had been negligent, had turned a blind eye to less-than-adequate stable practices or had a third party, such as a vet, being left to their own devices without supervision.
He argued there should not be a penalty imposed on the trainers because they had already suffered considerable ongoing costs.
All five horses were disqualified from the races in which they tested positive.
In Wilde’s case, his stable lost $150,000 in Sirileo Miss’s group-3 winnings and her sale value as a brood mare was said to have dropped from $800,000 to $400,000.
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