Three players set to be targeted by ASADA over use of banned peptide CJC-1295

[Brissie Kid]

Australian Crime Commission would end drugs in sport probe under an Abbott government

http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/national/australian-crime-commission-would-end-drugs-in-sport-probe-under-an-abbott-government/story-fncynkc6-1226630960937

THE Australian Crime Commission would be directed to stop investigating drugs in sport under an Abbott Government so it can chase "serious criminals" instead, the Opposition's justice spokesman Michael Keenan says.

The body used its extensive powers, like the power to phone tap, in a wide-ranging investigation into drugs in sport that found wide-spread use and pointed to organised crime being involved in supply and match-fixing.

The findings led to anti-doping body ASADA's current focus on NRL and AFL clubs.

But Mr Keenan said it was now time for ASADA to take over and for the powerful Crime Commission to get back to chasing bikies and "crime kingpins".

"The Crime Commission is the most powerful law-enforcement agency in the country ... (and) they should be focusing on the most serious criminals that we do have and that's what we will direct them to do if we do get a chance to govern after September," he told ABC TV.

He said Australia had specific anti-doping authorities to deal with doping, and they should be given the resources to do that job.

"It's the Crime Commission that we believe need to be focused on the most serious criminals in our community and when I think of the most serious criminals I think of bikies and I think of the crime kingpins within the most serious organised criminal investigations."

When asked whether that directive would clash with the Crime Commission's own findings that organised crime were involved in match-fixing, Mr Keenan said: "They have looked extensively at this and I think it's now time for ASADA to take the running on it."

"The Crime Commission has the broadest powers of any law enforcement agency in Australia and we believe that they should be looking at the most serious criminal activities ... that would be bikie gangs."

Nothing about stopping ASADA.

 

[Ralphie]

I have a huuuuuge ruler.


fyi

I never ever claimed it was big, but by god it's pretty!!!!!

---

As to the actual drugs issue, we have 3 camps. One believes there is no major issue at all, at least not in NRL,

Not quite. What I believe is:
Richard Ings' statement was overkill and unfairly blackened the reputation of every sports professional in the country. ASADA has next to nothing and has been fishing by blackmailing NRL players to come forward or lose their livelihoods. It was triggered by Essendon and a faint whiff that other teams 'might' have been involved.

I would be very happy if there is no major issue but don't discount it as a possibility. Every step taken by ACC and ASADA has so far been farcical in their handling, they have failed to produce any evidence of systematic knowledge by players of wrong-doing, of infiltration of crime figures or of players throwing games, and they have tainted the image of sport for fans with little justification.

I agree with this assessment.

 

[Phantar]

Richard Ings' nickname is 'R'. As in Dick Rings. Apparently he digs a bit of self-mutilation.

 

[Matabele]

Fair enough Gronk

I should have elaborated more...

How often do you hear "i am going to sue" as a first response....and then nothing

I've heard it plenty. Never been sued.

 

[Kiwi Eagle]

To go completely off track, a fan of the Chicago Bulls in suing their star Derrick Rose, who has been out for over a year injured now, for the emotional pain and stress it has caused him supporting the side without the star on court

 

[RL Gronk]

To go completely off track, a fan of the Chicago Bulls in suing their star Derrick Rose, who has been out for over a year injured now, for the emotional pain and stress it has caused him supporting the side without the star on court

Sometimes I have felt like suing Steve Matai's neck and Brett Stewart's knee for emotional anguish they have caused me lol

 

[Brissie Kid]

Powerful stuff here.

Moral and professional question I'm glad I didn't have to answer
Date
April 29, 2013 - 2:11PM

Brad Walter

"Tell me, is that a story you would have written?"

They were the words of a leading NRL coach last Friday after a rival newspaper quoted a legal risk assessment obtained by Cronulla officials to report a possible link between Jon Mannah's recurrence of Hodgkin's lymphoma and the supplements program at the club in 2011.

It is a question I have been repeatedly asked by officials, fellow reporters and even members of my own family amid the emotional reaction across the game to speculation about whether Mannah's death in January was related to the doping cloud over Australian sport.

The honest answer is that I don't know - but I am relieved not to have been burdened by having to make the ethical decision and judgement on the news value of such a story.

I, along with others at Fairfax Media, had heard that there was a mention of Mannah's illness in an internal Cronulla report compiled after Tricia Kavanagh's investigation into the Sharks that led to the sacking of four members of the club's football staff.

Roy Masters, who detailed the findings of the report - including allegations that former trainer Trent Elkin injected himself to show players the safety of the product, and claims a player had complained "not another injection" - in a Sun-Herald report on March 10, was also told that there was "an elephant in the room" in the story.

Masters concluded it was the possibility of Mannah being injected, but told me, "How do you write that? It would cause too much distress to the family."

As a journalist, you can usually justify a story - no matter how severe the fallout - if it is an official report or if it is in the public interest.

Before the rise of social media, it was widely accepted that what players did in their private lives was their own business, but if police or officials took action it became news.

Of course, if there was a genuine concern that an NRL star had died because of substances he took as part of a systematic doping program, it would be a story that demanded to be told.

Not to have done so would have been akin to aiding a cover-up.

However, Fairfax Media has been told that the section of the leaked report published in the Daily Telegraph was a legal risk assessment undertaken by Darren Kane of Colin W Love and Co on behalf of the Sharks, and was not included in the initial report compiled for Kavanagh and submitted to the NRL.

Kane merely stated that if Mannah - as a member of the 17-man NRL squad for five of Cronulla's matches during the 12 week period in question from March to May, 2011 in question - had been one of the players who took the supplements the Sharks have been accused of using, and a link between those substances was proven, the legal exposure faced by the club "has the potential to be as serious as matters could get".

This isn't meant to be a personal shot at the two reporters who visited the Mannah family last Thursday. They would have been under enormous pressure to write the story and one of them admitted on radio last weekend that he "misread" the situation, felt "crook in the guts" and regretted his involvement.

But in another weekend radio interview, Rebecca Wilson outlined how the Telegraph had pursued the story and indicated the paper had planned to drip-feed details of the 60-page report until the Sharks obtained a court injunction against News Ltd on Saturday.

"We just got information from high legal authorities and high law enforcement authorities that led us to do some searching for this report," Wilson told Triple M.

"The original tip for this story did not come from the person who leaked this report, the original tip for this story came from a law enforcement authority - and a very senior law enforcement authority - that led us to go in search of the report, which basically confirmed what we had been told."

The motives of those behind the leaks is another issue – but once the leak has occurred, the burden of responsibility falls to the media.
This was one occasion I was happy to have been scooped.

Why will no media go after the other big story here? Who is doing the leaking & why? It's been going on since the darkest day in sport conference.

 

[MadMarcus]

Why will no media go after the other big story here? Who is doing the leaking & why? It's been going on since the darkest day in sport conference.

Because they know who is doing the leaking and they don't want it to stop...

 

[manlyfan76]

Why will no media go after the other big story here? Who is doing the leaking & why? It's been going on since the darkest day in sport conference.

Because they know who is doing the leaking and they don't want it to stop...

Boom! The only way to pull the reins in on these "journos" is to have all clubs and fans boycott particular papers en mass.

 

[MissKate]

that has got to be one of the lamest attempts at trying to avert from a massive guilty conscience if there ever was one. trying to justify writing an article no self respecting journalists should have writen. shame on all those scumbag hacks

 

[Brissie Kid]

Brad Walter wrote the story today. He didn't do the hachet job. That was the Telegraph.

 

[Kiwi Eagle]

Wade Graham interviewed today, reached a stalemate halfway through, and the interviews are now suspended indefinitely

What an absolute joke this thing is

Something to do with the players having to give "reasonable assistance" and nobody knowing what that actually means

 

[manlyfan76]

This will go on all year and maybe further.

 

[Jatz Crackers]

No it wont

 

[manlyfan76]

No it wont

Do you "know" something?

 

[MWSE]

The players claim that they want this to be over. So why don't they answer the questions asked and be done with it?

Not to mention that Wade Graham clearly treated this with contempt by the way he dressed. Disgraceful look for the Sharks.

 

[Jatz Crackers]

No it wont

Do you "know" something?

The ARLC have been busy & are working from a much better position now.

 

[manlyfan76]

No it wont

Do you "know" something?

The ARLC have been busy & are working from a much better position now.

That's good because ASADA have done 1/2 an interview in all this time (12weeks?)Maybe the ARLC can put a fire crackers up them because now it will be a lawyer fight before the interviews start again. Plus ASADA are fighting a war on several fronts and that never works well.

 

[Pablo]

I think the way he dressed is a bit of a F U from wade. He thinks its a load of poop so dressed accordingly.

 

[Berkeley_Eagle]

I have no problem with the way he dressed
the T-shirt is clean