It also shows the government were more bent than an over ripe Q’ld banana.
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I hope Bruce is getting some level of acknowledgement by Hunt.
Comfortably in the top 8, except 6 of the other clubs in the 8 have played one less game. Likely we’ll be out of the 8 again by next week.
Our governance may have been lax, but at least we didn’t actively tank to get our first no.1 draft pick.
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The Court for Arbitration of Sport is a privately constructed Court, and has no legislative base in any jurisdiction in the world.
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Less legislative base than The Court of the Crimson King.
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Pure frippery, Deckham.
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Twitterise it?
because that is what clothier reported he had said to Hird but Hird was only the coach & Clothier should have told Hamilton who was the boss of the footy department the same information he says he told Hird
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Only Hird and the others who’d been at the meeting (Reid and Corcoran?) denied that he’d been as explicit as that and had conveyed a quite different message…i.e. Clothier lied in his teeth.
Which is something that concerns me if senior AFL officials and/or ASADA people get asked questions under oath in court…I have no doubt some of them would either perjure themselves or answer extremely obliquely.
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“There was discussion at the meeting about peptides and whether they were banned in sport. The AFL and the ASADA CEO were satisfied with Mr Hird’s explanation about his enquiry and the matter was taken no further.”
Source: AFL ADT full judgement, point 134, page 29.
So why did Clothier change his mind two years later with an email sent to ASADA hours after Wilson wrote her ‘AFL warned Hird’ front page junk?
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Protecting the AFL’s behind
I do wonder if something ever might come out that Clothier not only didn’t warn Hird but in fact as chief integrity officer green lighted supplement programs such as ours across the AFL league wide.
IIRC there was comment on the forum that Hamilton (as the person responsible) had brought our program to Clothier to do just that and was given the ok, plus was told whilst it was good it wasn’t as cutting edge as some of the other clubs programs.
No surprise that Hamilton has been looked after (knows too much), and that other clubs were keen to see EFC nailed to appease ASADA and ensure they weren’t scrutinized.
Choice would have been - saying they warned Hird peptides are bad (EFC acted alone) versus admitting allowing rife unchecked supplementation use to happen league wide … optics.
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All about covering their a…s
THE AUSTRALIAN, 07 DEC 2013, CHIP LE GRAND
Hird’s peptide warning 'added after publicity’
EVIDENCE of a “warning” delivered to James Hird about the use of peptide hormones was added to the case against Essendon nearly two years after the meeting took place and on the same day the allegation was first published in a newspaper.
AFL integrity officer Brett Clothier provided a detailed account of the August 5, 2011, meeting in an email to Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority investigators on July 17 this year. The account was included in ASADA’s interim report to the AFL two weeks later and relied on to establish Hird’s
“early awareness” of substances at the centre of the supplements scandal.
Mr Clothier’s evidence was added to the brief within hours of The Age publishing an allegation that Hird was warned by the AFL against the use of peptides in late 2011. The revelation in The Age was attributed to “sources close to the investigation”.
The allegation that Hird was warned off peptides before Essendon embarked on its disastrous 2012 season supplements program, along with sports scientist Stephen Dank’s claim he regularly injected Hird with the banned peptide Hexarelin, were the two most damaging allegations publicly aired
against him.
The Hexarelin claims were denied by Hird and not substantiated by ASADA.
When Hird gave evidence before ASADA on April 16, three months before Mr Clothier’s email, the Essendon coach was not asked about a warning.
Hird, his long-time mentor Danny Corcoran and Essendon football manager Paul Hamilton attended a meeting at Etihad Stadium with Mr Clothier and an ASADA representative on August 5, 2011.
The meeting was prompted by Hird asking an ASADA drug tester a general question about peptides during an Essendon training session earlier in the 2011 season.
ASADA interviewed the three Essendon officials who attended the August 5 meeting but did not ask any of them about a warning. It did not recall Hird to respond to Mr Clothier’s evidence.
It is understood Mr Clothier’s relatively brief, contemporaneous notes taken of the meeting contained no mention of a warning. In his email nearly two years later, shortly after midday on July 17, Mr Clothier provided more expansive detail. The Age article containing allegations of the warning was published that day.
Mr Clothier did not answer questions from The Weekend Australian. An ASADA spokesman said the agency was “unable to talk publicly about the specifics of its investigation”, which was ongoing.
The Weekend Australian has not seen a copy of Mr Clothier’s July 17 email. However, it is quoted at length in ASADA’s interim report relied on by the AFL to draft charges against Essendon, Hird, Corcoran, then assistant coach Mark Thompson and long-serving club doctor Bruce Reid.
Those charges resulted in Essendon being dumped from this year’s finals series and losing draft picks, Hird accepting a 12-month ban from coaching, Corcoran a four-month ban and Thompson, Essendon’s senior coach for next season, a $30,000 fine. The case against Dr Reid was abandoned.
The interim report says Mr Clothier told ASADA that at the end of the August 5 meeting, he “reiterated to Hird that peptides were a serious risk to the integrity of the AFL, in the same category as steroids and HGH”.
Mr Clothier told ASADA that he told Hird “peptides already appeared to be infiltrating other elite sports in Australia and that we (the AFL) could be next”. Mr Clothier told investigators he “implored” Hird to report to the AFL any information he came across relating to peptides.
The allegation that Hird and Essendon were warned about the use of peptides before the club hired Mr Dank, a sports scientist known for his advocacy of peptides, provided the starting point of the AFL narrative against the club and particularly Hird as a driving force behind the supplements program.
The ASADA report noted the issue was relevant to show Hird had an “early awareness” of peptides and their potential prohibition under anti-doping codes
Mr Clothier’s recollection goes beyond evidence of the ASADA official who attended the meeting cited in the interim report.
In a file note given to investigators and included in the interim report, the official said: “A general discussion then followed covering off ASADA’s belief various forms of peptides were increasingly being detected by Customs and other agencies and that the products were banned in sport”.
In his interview with ASADA, Hird said he had heard about peptides from recreational cyclists he occasionally rode with and had asked the drug tester what they were. He described the meeting with Mr Clothier and the ASADA official as a general discussion in which he was told some peptides were banned and others were not.
Corcoran was asked about the meeting in his ASADA interview and described it in similar terms to Hird. Hamilton, the most senior football department official present at the August meeting, provided evidence to ASADA on February 13 and was not asked about the meeting.
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16 June 2017
The Hon Greg Hunt MP
Minister for Sport
Dear Minister
The sixteen ‘Strands in the Cable’ in the Court of Arbitration for Sport’s (CAS) Judgement were the key elements in upholding the World Anti-Doping Authority’s (WADA) Appeal against the Australian Football League (AFL) Tribunal’s determination in favour of thirty-four players charged by the Australian Anti-Doping Sports Authority (ASADA) with anti-doping violations relating to Thymosin Beta-4. I have dissected those strands in detail and have proved they have no substance.
The Panel identified the strands in the cable supporting WADA’s case at clause 120 of its judgement. Today, I am addressing CAS rationale nonsense for Strand (x)
Strand (x) “Mr Dank’s job with Essendon and his reputation as a ‘sports guru’ depended upon improvement in the team’s results. It would have been inconsistent for him to seek to access TB-4 but then used it entirely for other purposes. On 9 March 2012, Mr Dank sent a text message to Mr Hird saying, “IV start next week. And Thymosin with Ubiquinone. We will start to see some real effects.”
My Comment
-
It was unconscionable for the panel to include this as a strand in the cable. i. The AFL Anti-Doping tribunal found Stephen Dank not guilty of administering a banned substance to the Essendon players. Neither WADA nor ASADA appealed the not guilty decision so it’s impossible, the panel’s bias and incompetence notwithstanding, to understand how the CAS panellists claimed that he was guilty, particularly when CAS did not hear any charges against him and he was not required to defend himself. My understanding is that even in China people have to be charged at least one minute before being pronounced guilty. ii. There was no evidence that Thymosin Beta-4 was ever present at Essendon. iii. There were no purchase orders for Thymosin Beta-4 iv. There was no evidence that anyone supplied Thymosin Beta-4 v. There were no invoices for Thymosin Beta-4 vi. There was no evidence that anyone saw Thymosin Beta-4 at Essendon vii. On the other hand, Dean Wallis testified that he took three vials of the WADA permitted Thymomodulin from Dank’s fridge. viii. Dean Wallis also tabled a photograph of a vial of Thymomodulin which he had removed from Dank’s fridge. ix. On 3 July 2012, ASADA’s science and results manager Dr Stephen Watt emailed WADA and said: “I wanted to enquire if WADA has considered the prohibited status of the drug Thymomodulin also known as Thymosin?” (my emphasis). Nothing could be clearer, the top science guru at ASADA agreed with Dank that Thymosin was the generic name for Thymomodulin. Thymosin was not the generic name for Thymosin Beta-4. x. If the players had contacted ASADA during 2012, as the CAS panel complained they should have, and asked about the status of Thymosin, ASADA would have told them that Thymosin was the generic name for Thymomodulin and it wasn’t banned. -
The two European panelists knew nothing about Australian Rules football and less than nothing about the machinations of the responsibilities of the Essendon staff. The Australian panelist knew less than the Europeans about AFL, and I suspect any sport. Consequently, the panel wasn’t qualified to pontificate on what Dank’s reputation depended. -
Stephen Dank was a consultant, and consequently, never had a performance appraisal. The club didn’t know where he lived and didn’t have a single piece of paper in a file about him. All he had to do to maintain the consultancy was to endear himself to the players and senior coach James Hird. A task that the evidence indicates he performed in a sycophantic way. Although Dank didn’t report to Hird, and although he wasn’t even in the same department as Hird, Dank continually sent Hird texts indicating what a wonderful job he was doing with the various tasks of his job. Dank never once indicated to Hird that he had administered Thymosin. -
Anyone who knows anything about Australian Rules football knows that there were too many people involved in the success or failure of the club to be able to quantify whether the sports scientist contributed to the improvement in the team’s results. -
There were 20 plus people providing input to improving the team’s results – senior coach; four assistant coaches; doctors; physiotherapists; psychologist, conditioner; weights trainer; nutritionist; masseuses; recruitment manager, talent scouts and runners to name just a few. -
Senior coach James Hird was probably the only person who depended upon improved results, not only to maintain his reputation, but to keep his job. -
There were never any suggestions that Hird considered using banned substances to achieve improved results. In fact, on a number of occasions Hird informed senior football staff, including the high performance manager Dean Robinson and Dank that every substance used had to be WADA permitted; the Essendon doctors had to approve the use of every substance; the players were free to opt in or opt out of the programmes; and that no substance could be used if there were any chance of it harming the players. -
There were 17 sports scientists at the other 17 clubs with similar responsibilities and ambitions with Dank. All wanted to improve their clubs results. If we accept the panel’s flawed logic it means those 17 sports scientists may also have used a banned substance. Clearly, that is fanciful. -
It is incomprehensible that the panel used such flawed logic to arrive at its inevitably flawed determinations. In essence, the panel was saying: i. Dank was a sports guru. There was no evidence to support that contention. In fact, ASADA claimed that it was widely known that Dank had a poor reputation, and the AFL charged Essendon with employing a person with a poor reputation. ii. Dank’s reputation as a ‘sports guru’ depended on improvement in the team’s results, so therefore, he used a banned substance to achieve that objective. iii. Dank sought access to Thymosin Beta-4, which meant he administered it to 34 players. iv. It would be ‘inconsistent’ for Dank to use Thymosin Beta-4 in his private clinic and not use it on the players -
Therefore, Dank must have administered Thymosin Beta-4 to the players -
My response to the panel’s flawed logic:
The panel implied that Dank only had one function to fulfil, that of recommending supplements to be taken. On 30 September 2011, Essendon sent Dank the following letter:
Dear Stephen, I formally confirm your offer of employment with the Essendon Football Club … Please find detailed below the relevant terms and conditions of your employment. Performance scientist. [You] report to Dean Robinson, the high-performance coach … On a weekly basis your job description can be summarised as follows: involvement in all sessions as required by Dean Robinson, the high performance coach; undertake research in the areas of biomechanics and physiology to aid the improvement of player development, the biomechanics and sprinting, including but not limited to ground contact time, stride frequency and stride length along the horizontal and lateral power generation, areas of resiliency, including but not limited to drawing screenings and injury prevention action intervention, sleep studies in cardiovascular and respiratory testing, and its applications to performance. Involvement in research being conducted into other areas which relate to the performance of the team; responsible for collection and logging of all loading data as it pertains to the condition of the players.” Responsible for the design of supplementation protocols and recovery procedures and their implementation.
-
As it transpired, Essendon contracted Dank’s company to provide consultancy services on the same basis as the above letter. -
It is nonsensical to imply that improved results could only be achieved by Dank through using a banned substance. The above letter meant that he had to perform many tasks. Recommending supplements was a small cog in the Dank wheel. Dank was a very small cog in a gigantic Essendon wheel. -
It was impossible to quantify which of Dank’s tasks would have helped improve results more than the other, let alone which task contributed more than the tasks of the entire staff. -
Employment opportunities in Dank’s field were very limited. He knew that his reputation as a sports scientist would be ruined were he found to be administering a banned substance to the players. -
Dank knew that the chances of being caught through random testing would be very high if he were administering banned substances to as many as 45 players. -
The players’ contract responsibilities meant that even the village idiot wouldn’t believe he could fool 45 players and administer a banned substance. Clause 7.4 of the AFL’s Anti-Doping Code required each player to table with the club doctor at the start of each season a list of every substance taken by the player at the club and away from the club in the previous 12 months. -
I was a professional sportsman and managed an elite professional sportsman for 20 years, and if we had had to comply with clause 7.4, I would have recorded every minute detail from the label of each vial administered. Most of my team-mates would have done the same thing. It is inconceivable that Dank wouldn’t think a number of players out of a group of 45 wouldn’t be thorough and report him if he tried to administer a banned substance. As ten players must be sacked every year, it was inevitable a disgruntled sacked player would have reported Dank if he were using a banned substance. -
Dank made no enquiries as to whether the players were vigilant in fulfilling their clause 7.4 obligations. Therefore, it is illogical to think that he would believe that he could get away with administering banned substances. -
Seeking access to TB-4 and obtaining access are different things. I’ve asked many women for a date but few said yes. -
Dank used TB-4 at his Medical Rejuvenation Clinic, perfectly legally. It was an Ageing clinic. -
TB-4 is a prohibited supplement for professional sportspeople, so there is nothing inconsistent in Dank administering the supplement legally to his private clinic patients, but not as a banned substance to the Essendon players -
There is no evidence that the ‘Thymosin’ referred to in Dank’s message to Hird is anything other than Thymomodulin (or its ‘twin’ Thymosin Alpha-1) as Dank has asserted frequently. A view shared by ASADA science guru Dr Stephen Watt. See point 1 (ix) and (x) above. -
Dank sent Hird weekly text messages on the names of the players who had been administered Vitamin B and C intravenously. He never sent Hird a message indicating that he had commenced administering Thymosin. -
WADA tabled evidence that a variety of Thymosin didn’t become available until mid-May 2012. The text referred to in Strand (x) was sent 9 March 2012. There is evidence that Dank used the permitted AOD-9604 during this period. AOD-9604 has comparable healing properties as the banned Thymosin Beta-4. It is illogical that he would use Thymosin Beta-4, particularly, according to WADA, when it wasn’t available until mid-May. -
Dank thought that AOD-9604 could be ‘worth billions’. It was in his interests to use it to obtain proof of its healing qualities.
-
There is no evidence that Thymosin Beta-4 was ever present at Essendon. -
There is irrefutable evidence that Dank used Thymosin Beta-4 at his MRC clinic. -
WADA withheld evidence that Melbourne Football Club used Thymomodulin that was supplied by Dank. It is incomprehensible that Dank would use Thymosin Beta-4 at one club and Thymomodulin at the second club.
Minister, the panel was contemptable in including this as a strand in the cable. It has no validity. If you can’t see that you have a major problem apart from the growing army of people who can’t understand why you and the Prime Minister are covering up misconduct and/or corruption by the AFL, ASADA, WADA, the Court of Arbitration for Sport, VWA and the Ombudsman’s office.
I am becoming more and more embarrassed at humiliating you like this. Surely, it is time you called off the jam and established a Royal Commission.
There is no chance that you can save your mate Gillon McLachlan so you should start thinking of your reputation and your obligations as the sports minister.
Yours faithfully
Bruce Francis
19 Likes
Lies and deceit all the way through the investigation. Anyone who believes otherwise, after reading the evidence is kidding themselves, delusional or don’t want to know the truth. The same people who believe the stories told by those involved from the top down, also believe they who would NOT lie; unfortunately, that is most of the footy public.
Far too many smoke and mirrors games have been played for anyone to come clean now and there are too many people involved in the deception, who have much to lose. Anyone who believes that everyone who takes the stand in a court room always tell the truth, also believe in Santa Claus and the Tooth Fairy.
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“Thoroughly discredited” you say. Can you please provide the who, when and where that supports your claim.
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OK, Campers. I see your social litigator (Natalie Hickey) and I raise you a Ray Finkelstein, Neil Young, Ken Hayne, John Nixon, Jackson Taylor, David Grace, David Jones, Tony Hargreaves, Wayne Henwood, Julian Burnside, Jack Rush, Stephen Peak, Steve Amendola. Brendan Schwab, Allistar Twigg.
14 Likes
19 June 2017
The Hon Greg Hunt MP
Minister for Sport
Dear Minister
The sixteen ‘Strands in the Cable’ in the Court of Arbitration for Sport’s (CAS) Judgement were the key elements in upholding the World Anti-Doping Authority’s (WADA) Appeal against the Australian Football League (AFL) Tribunal’s determination in favour of thirty-four players charged by the Australian Anti-Doping Sports Authority (ASADA) with anti-doping violations relating to Thymosin Beta-4. I have dissected those strands in detail and have proved they have no substance.
The Panel identified the strands in the cable supporting WADA’s case at clause 120 of its judgement.
Today, I am addressing CAS rationale nonsense for Strand (xiii)
Strand (xiii) ‘Mr Dank had been anxious from the start to divert attention away from the substances he was proposing to use and to downplay their true nature. In a text message exchange on 4 October 2011, Mr Dank discussed with Mr Robinson the use of peptides including (expressly) ‘Thymosin’. He said, “GLBC and Thymosin are just peptides. No worries there.” Mr Robinson said, “Can we just call them amino acids? or something of that kind?” Mr Dank responded, “Yes, that is all they are. An amino acid blend.” Adding that they should “leave peptides out” in the description of what was being used.’
My Comment
-
To find the players guilty, the CAS panel had to have sufficient evidence to be comfortably satisfied that:
i. Dank did not use an immune booster at Essendon ii. Thymosin was the generic name for Thymosin Beta-4 iii. Thymosin Beta-4 was purchased by Dank for use at Essendon iv. Thymosin Beta-4 was present at Essendon v. Dank administered Thymosin Beta-4 to each of the 34 players. -
The panel had an impossible task of proving Thymosin was the generic name for Thymosin Beta-4 because during 2012, ASADA’s official position was that Thymosin was the generic name for the WADA permitted immune booster Thymomodulin. On 3 July 2012, ASADA’s science and results manager Dr Stephen Watt emailed WADA and said:
“I wanted to enquire if WADA has considered the prohibited status of the drug THYMOMODILIN ALSO KNOWN AS THYMOSIN?” (my emphasis).
Nothing could be clearer, the top science guru at ASADA agreed with Dank that Thymosin was the generic name for Thymomodulin. Thymosin wasn’t the generic name for Thymosin Beta-4.
-
As there was no purchase orders, delivery notes, invoices, photos for Thymosin Beta-4, nor acknowledgement by a single player that he was administered Thymosin Beta-4, in desperation, the panel has opted for the ludicrous Hail-Mary pass.
-
To determine that ‘Mr Dank had been anxious from the start to divert attention away from the substances he was proposing to use and to downplay their true nature’ is another extraordinary example of the panel’s view that they can read minds, particularly as none of them has even met Dank, let alone asked him about his state of mind and motives.
-
The panel disingenuously decided that Dank choosing to use the name ‘amino acid’ instead of the name ‘peptide’ compensated for there being no purchase orders, invoices, photos and admission by the players of using Thymosin Beta-4.
-
Dank’s choice of using ‘amino acid’ instead of ‘peptide’ was meaningless because some peptides are banned and some are permitted and some amino acids are banned and some are permitted. Both terms are acceptable. For example, Thymomodulin and Thymosin Alpha 1 are peptides and they are not banned. Thymosin Beta-4 is a peptide and is banned. All three are amino acids and are widely referred to as such.
-
Dank chose to use the term amino acid because he believed there was less ignorance about them than there was about the word ‘peptides’.
-
The stupidity of the panel claiming that Dank using the term amino acid instead of peptide was proof 34 players were administered Thymosin Beta-4 was evidenced in the check list used by ASADA in its interviews. During the player interviews, ASADA interviewers referred to a checklist that was titled ‘Amino Acids’. The substances were referred to by ASADA as amino acids not peptides.
-
Furthermore, ASADA used the term amino acids itself. As an example, on page 385 of the Interim Report, ASADA wrote:
‘Essendon players were also injected with an amino acid blend at HyperMED by Dr Hooper. A sample of the amino acid blend was not recovered.
According to Dr Hooper’s patient records, 33 players received a total of 112 injections of amino acids.’
- In an endeavour to create a case that Dank had sinister motives for using the term ‘amino acid’ instead of peptide, ASADA turned to its talisman, its star witness, Shane Charter. ASADA asked Charter to comment on the use of the term ‘amino acid”. ASADA reported the exchange on page 89 of its Interim Report as follows:
‘As part of this investigation, Mr Shane Charter was also interviewed by ASADA. Mr Charter is a ‘biochemist with post-graduate studies in nutrition, followed up by exercise physiology and then [an] Australian Pharmaceutical Manufacturers Diploma. Mr Charter’s credentials and business relationship with Mr Dank will be discussed extensively throughout the report. Mr Charter believes that the term ‘Amino Acid’ is a sufficiently generic term within the anti-Ageing industry that it could, ‘technically’ be used to describe a variety of peptides.
‘An amino acid is simply a sequence of you know, of base proteins at a specific length … so all peptides are in short, sequences of amino acids’.
-
Dank, ASADA, Dr Hooper and Charter were not the only ones using the term Amino acids. In June 2012, Carlton Football Club became aware of compounding pharmacist Nima Alavi who had been working with Essendon’s high performance and nutrition team. Carlton high performance manager Justin Cordy and physiologist Johann Bilsborough met with Alavi. According to Cody (see Interim Report page 94) during their meeting with Alavi the topics of conversation were tailor made ‘amino acid’ therapy.
-
To WADA’s disappointment, ASADA, Charter, Dr Hooper and Alavi’s comments debunked the notion that Dank had sinister motives in using the term amino acids instead of peptides.
-
To its shame, the panel once again cherry picked the evidence, and didn’t take into account Charter’s evidence or ASADA’s persistent use of the term amino acid.
Minister, clearly the panel using Dank choosing the term ‘amino acid’ as a strand in the cable was wrong. To compound their grievous mistake, the panel ignored the evidence that ASADA, Charter, Dr Hooper and Alavi all used the term ‘amino acid’.
Minister, I received an email from you on 3 March 2017. Incidentally, that was the last time you paid me the courtesy of responding to my communications. Inter alia, you said:
“In relation to the other material provided by yourself and others, I requested my department to review this information as to whether there was any new or significant material outside of those matters are covered by the court proceedings. After a full and extensive review, I have been informed by my department the information provided does not contain new or substantial material beyond what has previously been considered. This includes material reported in the Herald Sun on 24 February 2017. On that basis the advice is clear and categorical that the matters canvassed do not give rise to a further Federal government investigation given the already extensive court review process.”
At the time, I had to check your letter to ascertain whether it was written on April 1 because I could have compiled off the top of my head a list of over 100 issues that were new and significant outside of those matters covered by court proceedings. I have given you and the prime minister hundreds of them but it appears that your staff are either incompetent, dishonest or have treated you with contempt.
It appears that it has been 1 April in your office for the last three months. I have now provided you with irrefutable proof that the Court of Arbitration for Sport panel’s first 13 strands in the cable are junk and have no validity. What are you going to do about. Surely, you cannot be so callous or so lazy not to do anything to salvage the reputations of the 34 Essendon players that were so unjustly destroyed.
Yours faithfully
Bruce Francis
5 Likes
Take it from me Dank would love to be in court in the witness box as long as his legal team were able to question his accusers under oath. And who at the AFL would want that. Certainly not the two individuals named in Jackson Taylor’s writ.
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For me. Fixed.
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