Bruce seems to have ramped up his campaign. The alarming aspect is the possibility this type of public authority behaviour is not just confined to the Health Dept and ASADA. We have our own example with the AFL shutting down any questions about its controversial behaviour. Nothing seems to operate on the principles we expect.
The Hon Greg Hunt MP
Minister for Sport
Dear Minister
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On numerous occasions I have given you irrefutable evidence that the AFL, ASADA, WADA, the Court of Arbitration for Sport, the Ombudsman’s office, the Victorian WorkSafe Authority and the Gillard government were guilty of corruption and/or misconduct during the Essendon saga. Sadly, I think a case could be made against decisions made by the Anti-Doping Rule Violation Panel (ADRVP) members who appear to have rubber stamped ASADA CEO Ben McDevitt’s ‘illegal’ recommendation after a duplicit ADRVP meeting.
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For the benefit of the copyists to this email, and your staff, before identifying the way the process was conducted, I shall outline the Reader’s Digest version of the process the 34 Essendon players were subjected.
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ASADA investigates possible anti-doping violations and issues Show Cause Notices if it thinks a case could be made against an athlete
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ASADA presents the evidence to the Anti-Doping Report Violation Panel.
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The ADRVP decides whether an assertion of a possible anti-doping rule violation by an athlete or support person should be made. In the Essendon case, it had to decide whether an assertion of possible administration of Thymosin Beta-4 by each of the Essendon players
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If the ADRVP decides it were possible that the athlete was administered Thymosin Beta-4, it makes a Register of Findings.
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With respect to Essendon, ASADA issued Show Cause Notices to 34 players
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ASADA was required to do two things:
i. Present evidence to the ADRVP members that would enable them to assert that it was possible Thymosin was Thymosin Beta-4
ii. Present evidence to the ADRVP members that would enable them to assert that it was possible each of the 34 players was administered Thymosin Beta-4.
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Each player’s evidence folder contained on average 300 pages. That’s a total of 10,200 pages of evidence.
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In a major game-ending breach of the rules, ASADA admitted that the information given to the ADRVP members also contained CEO Ben McDevitt’s recommendation.
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ASADA claimed it took one minute to read each page in the players’ files.
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Thus, it would have taken each ADRVP member 170 hours to read the evidence against all 34 players. That’s assuming there were no toilet breaks. There are 168 hours in a week.
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As the ADRVP members did not receive the 10,200 pages before 24 October 2014, it was impossible for them to have read each player’s evidence file before the 3 November 2014 ADRVP meeting.
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ASADA lawyers Elen Perdikogiannis and Emily Fitton were tasked on 3 November 2014 with presenting evidence that would enable the ADRVP members to assert that it was possible that Thymosin was Thymosin Beta-4, and deciding whether an assertion of a possible anti-doping rule violation by each player should be made. That is, assert that it was possible that each of the 34 players was administered Thymosin Beta-4.
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It is vital to remember that the case had to be made against each player in his own right. It was not a one in, all in, class action.
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As my research indicated that there were only 24 hours on 3 November 2014, it was impossible for Perdikogiannis and Fitton to address each of the 10,200 pages of evidence.
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Consequently, ASADA had to select an incredibly small number of pages from each player’s file to present and address.
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If it took one minute to read a page and one minute for ASADA to talk to the evidence on that page, and if the ADRVP members didn’t ask a single question, it would have taken just on six hours to present just five of the 300 pages in each player’s evidence file.
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Yesterday, 23 May 2017, ASADA sent me a document that contained my 22 June 2016 FOI request; ASADA’s response; and it’s decision. It should lead to a number of ASADA people being sacked.
Revised Request
ASADA RESPONSE
Decision
The documents/notes/slides ASADA used to persuade the ADRVP that Thymosin was Thymosin Beta-4
ADRVP engages in a deliberative process in order to decide whether an assertion of a possible anti-doping rule violation by an athlete or support person should be made. The panel is not a tribunal or a Court and does not need to be persuaded. It makes an assertion on the possibility of an ADRP.
There is no single document that was given to the ADRVP on the issue of whether Thymosin was Thymosin Beta-4. Rather there was a range of documents that allowed an inference to be drawn.
Sincere apologies to those of you who broke ribs laughing so heartedly at ASADA’s response and decision. Even though ASADA’s comment “there was a range of documents that allowed an inference to be drawn” is disingenuous, in the interests of transparency, ASADA should have released those alleged documents to me.
Revised Request
ASADA Response
Decision
The letters/texts/emails sent by Ben McDevitt to the ADRVP members before and after the 3 November 2014 meeting
Mr McDevitt was out of the country before, during and after the 3 November meeting on business. He did not correspond in any way (my emphasis) with the ADRVP members.
ASADA has released the agenda, the minutes of the meeting and the emails sent between the ADRVP secretariat and the members.
It should be noted that even if Mr McDevitt was at ASADA at the time, it is not the case that he would send correspondence to panel members and vice versa.
No further documents found
At 11.45 AM on Friday 24 October 2014, ASADA lawyer Emily Fitton sent an email to ASADA lawyer Elen Perdikogiannis under the Subject: ADRVP documentation. Inter alia, Fitton said:
“Once you’ve read through the template I’ve prepared, are (sic) can we have a chat about how best the documentation (PARTICULARLY THE CEO RECOMMENDATION) (my emphasis) should be loaded onto Govdex.
“My initial preference was that the CEO recommendation in its entirety should be loaded onto Govdex . So, in that sense, they [the ADRVP members] would get:
i. CEO Recommendation
ii. Revised Show Cause Notices (and reporting material) (which they now all should have on flash drives)
“A lot of the attachments in the Show Cause Notices are DRAWN FROM THE CEO RECOMMENDATION (my emphasis) …
This internal ASADA email indicates that ASADA lied to me yesterday when it claimed McDevitt didn’t correspond in any way with the ADRVP. Second, ASADA’s comments yesterday infer it was wrong for McDevitt to correspond with the ADRVP members.
ASADA should have released McDevitt’s “Recommendation” document to me.
Revised Request
ASADA Response
Decision
Given that ASADA claimed that it spoke to each of the 34 player’s cases during the 3 November 2014 ADRVP meeting, and given that it was impossible to speak to each of the 300 to 400 pages in each players file, ASADA must have spoken to about two or three pages from each player’s file. I require those pages.
At the time it was common for an ASADA officer to comment on the material to the ADRVP members.
In this case the ASADA officers [Elen Perdikogiannis and Emily Fitton] didn’t ‘speak to’ specific pages of each players file.
No documents
Sincere apologies to those of you who have thrown their computers out the window in a rage. ASADA was required to present its case against each player in his own right. In earlier correspondence, ASADA claimed it did. Now we are being told that ASADA didn’t speak to specific pages of a player’s file.
As the ADRVP members were required to assess each player’s case on its own merits, and in ASADA’s own words didn’t, clearly the whole ADRVP process was a farce. Both ASADA and the ASADA panel’s action were unconscionable and should be investigated by a Royal Commission.
A Register of Findings should not have been made against any of the players. The whole saga should have been declared dead and buried at that point. There should not have been an AFL Anti-Doping Tribunal hearing nor a Court of Arbitration for Sport hearing.
Minister, I am way past the not knowing whether to laugh or cry at you, the Prime Minister and the media condoning the widespread corruption, misconduct and lies by the AFL and so many quasi government organisations.
Yours faithfully
Bruce Francis
