Time to get tough: Talk or life sentence

[Mad Elephant Man]

No one interested

 

[Unkown]

I think life sentances are the way to do it, only way you are going to scare the **** out of guys enough to stop doping. And no more of these 6 month deals where guys basically get off scot free just for talking, especially when its from the months of October to March.

 

[MarkvW]

I think life sentances are the way to do it, only way you are going to scare the **** out of guys enough to stop doping. And no more of these 6 month deals where guys basically get off scot free just for talking, especially when its from the months of October to March.

Here's the problem: Dope testing technology is ALWAYS significantly behind doping technology. All the dope testers have always said this. It's a problem that is never going to be solved.

Doping is always done in secret. There is no way that you are going to catch dopers without snitches. There is no way that you are going to catch snitches without deals.

Finally, judges are always extremely reluctant to impose overly harsh sentences. People get off because judges are human--they don't want to be unreasonably cruel.

What you want to do is create a culture where riders perceive dopers as people who are cheating them personally. Then they will freely snitch. But riders (contrary to fans and Clinic denizens) do not think of dopers as people who are cheating them personally. Until then, we needs our snitches . . . and we needs our deals.

 

[DirtyWorks]

Here's the problem: Dope testing technology is ALWAYS significantly behind doping technology. All the dope testers have always said this. It's a problem that is never going to be solved.

Do back-dated testing with current penalties. Problem solved. It also adds substantial risk to the decision to dope.

Finally, judges are always extremely reluctant to impose overly harsh sentences. People get off because judges are human--they don't want to be unreasonably cruel.

What judges are we talking about here? Criminal judges let athletes off for *doping* because it's not a crime. What crimes are tried (ex. perjury) are related to doping, not doping itself. People are okay with athletes doping otherwise there would be criminal law with serious punishments.

As for sports issues, the powers WADA has are relatively new and the loopholes aren't all closed. And then you have athletes that won't stop appealing until they exhaust their national courts system. Add to that, the federations themselves being weak on anti-doping processes. You get a few positives let off on technicalities.

 

[DirtyWorks]

I think life sentances are the way to do it, only way you are going to scare the **** out of guys enough to stop doping. And no more of these 6 month deals where guys basically get off scot free just for talking, especially when its from the months of October to March.

While I agree, the problem with life sentences is what happens if there's a false positive? We know the system has a heavy bias for lowering the chance of a false positive, but it can still happen.

If the bio-passport were funded better and WADA had the authority to open cases on their own, the two strikes model is okay. Not great, but okay.

 

[Master50]

It is pretty simple actually the number of cheats is %20 or %80 of the doping is done by %20 of the ridersBut there is still %20 of the doping that is done by the other %80 if the 80/20 rule can be applied. The standard distribution of cheats in sport is likely close to the same as the random population. Sure in sport the cheaters are often all cheating the same things. This can also be applied to a statistical analysis of clean riders. %20 are saintly clean which can mean that the other %60 are in between angel and the devil I think we are getting very close to returning to a standard distribution of humanity amongst the riders. There are lots of honest people in pro cycling and I think we are hearing their voices.
Cycling is closer to the best example of anti doping progress than most any other sport. Most IOC sports are far dirtier than we are at this point in time. Maybe not 6 years ago but today.

 

[MarkvW]

Do back-dated testing with current penalties. Problem solved. It also adds substantial risk to the decision to dope.



What judges are we talking about here? Criminal judges let athletes off for *doping* because it's not a crime. What crimes are tried (ex. perjury) are related to doping, not doping itself. People are okay with athletes doping otherwise there would be criminal law with serious punishments.

As for sports issues, the powers WADA has are relatively new and the loopholes aren't all closed. And then you have athletes that won't stop appealing until they exhaust their national courts system. Add to that, the federations themselves being weak on anti-doping processes. You get a few positives let off on technicalities.

I agree (very much) with your ideas about back testing. And it will help. But there will be functionally undiscoverable therapies. You're still going to need snitches.

Nobody's going to participate in a sport, where one positive test kills a career. That's utterly abusive to the riders. They get abused enough in this cruel sport.

 

[the asian]

The current two strikes model is the best. The only thing to add, is a more lengthier ban for EPO/Blood doping/HGH etc, because right now you get two years for even in very small levels of some drugs under the strict liability rule and the same punishment for testing positive for EPO/HGH etc.

The adverse effect of that though would be a wider use of masking agents.

Life ban for one strike is way too harsh. There should be a second chance .

 

[JMBeaushrimp]

Hopefully an independent TRC can be formed shortly.

Come clean, help the system out, shorter penalty.

After that - FOR EVERYONE - 2 year ban for a pos. Life for a second.

One month off for the team the rider was on, and a lot of bad media.

This talk about routing every past doper from the sport is silly, they actually are the guys you need in the sport. Particularly if you're staffing a team. You could try to throw someone into that world, but I'm pretty sure they'd crumble.

Not every past doper wanted to dope, and they could actually help the sport a lot.

 

[Mad Elephant Man]

Great. I write a long post and nobody replies.
I edit my post because no one replies and now people are replying.

 

[Dazed and Confused]

This talk about routing every past doper from the sport is silly, they actually are the guys you need in the sport. Particularly if you're staffing a team. You could try to throw someone into that world, but I'm pretty sure they'd crumble.

lol, yes clearly running and staffing a team in pro cycling requires the brightest people on earth.

So how many injections have you done? 250? sorry, not good enough.

 

[blackcat]

I would think the electric chair is more hormone than the noose?

 

[peterst6906]

I don't know that 'talk or life' would encourage anything other than a continuation of the past - omerta during doping and deny, deny, deny claiming innocence when caught.

Talk or Life seems like a system that wouldn't survive good legal challenge, but that's from a layman's perspective.

What I would like to see:

If a rider provides information to the doping commission that leads to a positive test/ban, then the informing rider receives all of the UCI points of the sanctioned rider.

Not sure that this would work, because it adds an adversarial aspect to the riders in a team, but there should be some incentive for riders to come forward and/or to perhaps not dope.

I think I'd also like to see greater stability (in terms of long term pro team status) granted for teams who maintain clean riders (this is hard to prove and may also just promote omerta), while teams that have positives receive reductions/penalties on their tour status and/or non-renewal of pro team classification, ala Katusha.

 

[MarkvW]

I don't know that 'talk or life' would encourage anything other than a continuation of the past - omerta during doping and deny, deny, deny claiming innocence when caught.

Talk or Life seems like a system that wouldn't survive good legal challenge, but that's from a layman's perspective.

What I would like to see:

If a rider provides information to the doping commission that leads to a positive test/ban, then the informing rider receives all of the UCI points of the sanctioned rider.

Not sure that this would work, because it adds an adversarial aspect to the riders in a team, but there should be some incentive for riders to come forward and/or to perhaps not dope.

I think I'd also like to see greater stability (in terms of long term pro team status) granted for teams who maintain clean riders (this is hard to prove and may also just promote omerta), while teams that have positives receive reductions/penalties on their tour status and/or non-renewal of pro team classification, ala Katusha.

The whole point of sport is placings resulting from honest competition. It wouldn't make sense to give points for snitching. Then it would turn into a snitching competition, not a bike competition.

 

[peterst6906]

The whole point of sport is placings resulting from honest competition. It wouldn't make sense to give points for snitching. Then it would turn into a snitching competition, not a bike competition.

Yeah I agree on the aims of sport, but if riders are doping, then that has already failed.

With some recent systems introduced that are doomed to failure already, riders are being encouraged to come forward, but there's no real incentive to do so.

With a system based around carrots and sticks, the penalties also need to be balanced by incentives.

It's a difficult issue to try to come up with incentives, but if the riders are cheating on each other already, then there is no "honest competition".

 

[blackcat]

The whole point of sport is placings resulting from honest competition. It wouldn't make sense to give points for snitching. Then it would turn into a snitching competition, not a bike competition.

Yeah I agree on the aims of sport, but if riders are doping, then that has already failed.

With some recent systems introduced that are doomed to failure already, riders are being encouraged to come forward, but there's no real incentive to do so.

With a system based around carrots and sticks, the penalties also need to be balanced by incentives.

It's a difficult issue to try to come up with incentives, but if the riders are cheating on each other already, then there is no "honest competition".

both right.

we are not watching sport.

we are watching an entertainment business.

no criminals on asphalt. leave out the personal. armstrong, off-the-bike, yeah, thats criminal. on bike, no.

drug tests dont work. like haverford said, they are about the appearance of honest and healthy elite sport. its not.

cycling microcosm. ricco is the useful idiot/scapegoat.

in pro "sport", cycling serves this purpose.

the market decided doping was a big winner.

 

[BroDeal]

The Brailsford version of the plan:

Twenty-five or so riders get an ultimatum. Talk or life. After that the rest of the riders are ordered to not talk because there has already been enough talking. Coincidently none of the twenty-five belong to Brailsford's team.

That is the way forward.

 

[RobbieCanuck]

Use discretion

I think life sentances are the way to do it, only way you are going to scare the **** out of guys enough to stop doping. And no more of these 6 month deals where guys basically get off scot free just for talking, especially when its from the months of October to March.

In most criminal justice systems, while criminal codes set a maximum penalty for most crimes, the judge has a discretion to impose a fit sentence (excepting those crimes where there is a mandatory minimum). I think the same should be the case in cycling. Forget the standard two years or the rare life sentence, but let the punishment fit the crime. If 5 years is appropriate then it should be 5 years, 8 years or 10 years or whatever. In the case of Lance Armstrong, life is appropriate.

But these "stock" suspensions make a mockery of the system by failing to take into account the aggravting factors.

 

[ElChingon]

If I remember right they got tough on dopers after Tom Simpson, then got even tougher after the Gwiess team fiasco, then even more tougher after the Festina affair, then raised the roof after the 1999 Giro raids, then blew the roof off after the TVM team fiasco, then blew the roof to the upper atmosphere after the 2006 Operacion Puerto case commenced, then blew the roof to outer space when the Freiberg (sp?) Clinic issue started, then blew the roof past Mars after what happened to Pantani and El Chaba, then blew the roof past Pluto after they discovered the test for the EPO marker in ... what was the name for that special EPO thing Ricco and his teammate got busted for, then blew the roof to beyond our solar system after Floyd got busted, then the roof reached Alpha Centari after Rasmussen's Mexico excuse, then I think they lost the roof after that.

(I left out many roof levels so don't panic)

So how much more tougher can they get

 

[martinvickers]

Do back-dated testing with current penalties. Problem solved. It also adds substantial risk to the decision to dope.

And that is happening now, to the extent samples are now openly kept for retesting. It's probablly just as much responsible for the clear 'dialling back' as the blood passport, if not more so.

The problem however is that is legally very difficult to do retrospectively - i.e. it's very difficult legally to turn round to someone who doped in say 98 and say - oh, we retest those samples now, if that wasn't 'agreed' or ;declared' beforehand - it risking failing Article 6 of the ECHR.

So going forward, 100% - it's about bloody time - and we know from athletics that it works too, both in terms of catching people, and detering others. Not everyone, because humans being human, some will cheat - but over time, the retrospective testing is great for breaking cultures...and for isolating the stubborn ones (see Belarus throwers, for example).

The only thing is, it takes time - in the meantime we need a mixture of investigations, snitches and the rest - and that's a messy business. Still, better that than continuing omerta...

 

[DirtyWorks]

And that is happening now, to the extent samples are now openly kept for retesting. It's probablly just as much responsible for the clear 'dialling back' as the blood passport, if not more so.

The problem however is that is legally very difficult to do retrospectively - i.e. it's very difficult legally to turn round to someone who doped in say 98 and say - oh, we retest those samples now, if that wasn't 'agreed' or ;declared' beforehand - it risking failing Article 6 of the ECHR.

Martin,

Thank you for your insight into the issue. I'm no lawyer and posts like this are invaluable.

FYI: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Article_6_of_the_European_Convention_on_Human_Rights

everyone is entitled to a fair and public hearing within a reasonable time
Two things:

1. I would argue the reasonable time clock starts after the positive is issued.

2. A sporting infraction isn't a crime, at least in the U.S. My understanding is the EU is roughly equivalent at the athlete level. France apparently has criminal law for PED distribution post-Festina.

Like many law issues, sometimes what is up is down and all that.