CAS clears 28 Russians of doping at 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi
Lifetime bans have been overturned and results reinstated
The Court of Arbitration for Sport has upheld the appeals of 28 Russians who were banned by the International Olympic Committee for doping at the 2014 Winter Games in Sochi.
Sport’s highest court partially upheld the appeals of 11 others, reducing their life bans to suspensions which cover this month’s Games in Pyeongchang.
The decision to clear so many of the banned Russians is a huge blow to the IOC’s approach to the Russian state-sponsored doping scandal and will be greeted with fury by athletes and anti-doping groups around the world.
Aleksandr Zubkov, the double Olympic bobsleigh champion and Russian flag-bearer in Sochi, is among the 11 whose anti-doping rule violations have been upheld, though, as have those of three members of the Russia’s second unit in the men’s four-man bob in 2014, which means Great Britain’s upgrade to bronze is confirmed.
The 39 appeals were heard in two batches in Geneva last week, with all but two athletes attending in person.
They were heard via video link.
Also appearing via video were their two chief accusers, the former head of the Moscow anti-doping laboratory Dr Grigory Rodchenkov, who fled to the United States in 2015 and has become the main whistleblower in the Russian doping scandal, and Professor Richard McLaren, the legal expert who examined Rodchenkov’s claims on behalf of the World Anti-Doping Agency.
McLaren’s landmark report, which was published in December 2016, revealed documentary, forensic and supporting witness testimony to corroborate Rodchenkov’s story of an increasingly sophisticated conspiracy to dope more than 1,000 Russian athletes, across 30 sports, over at least five years and two Olympic Games.
Converting that evidence into individual doping cases, however, has proved to be very difficult, as the IOC has just discovered, despite setting up two bespoke disciplinary commissions to build on McLaren’s work and prosecute athletes.
One of those commissions, led by former Swiss president Samuel Schmid, was the basis of December’s decision by the IOC to suspend the Russian Olympic Committee, which means Russia must send a neutral team of ‘Olympic Athletes from Russia’ to Pyeongchang, with no right to use the Russian anthem or flag in the opening or medal ceremonies.
But it is the work of the commission led by IOC member Denis Oswald that CAS has picked apart, as his job was to prosecute anti-doping cases against individuals, which meant proving their ‘dirty’ urine samples were swapped for ‘clean’ ones in Sochi.
“In 28 cases, the evidence collected was found to be insufficient to establish that an anti-doping rule violation (ADRV) was committed by the athletes concerned. With respect to these 28 athletes, the appeals are upheld, the sanctions annulled and their individual results achieved in Sochi 2014 are reinstated.
“In 11 cases, the evidence collected was found to be sufficient to establish an individual ADRV. The IOC decisions in these matters are confirmed, with one exception: the athletes are declared ineligible for the next edition of the Olympic Winter Games instead of a life ban from all Olympic Games.”
The decision to lift the life ban was widely expected, as CAS has previously ruled against attempts to go beyond the sanctions allowed by the WADA Code before, but the 28 successful appeals throw the IOC’s belated attempts to get tough with Russia into turmoil.
The appeals of three more Russians, all biathletes, will be heard after the 2018 Winter Games, which run from February 9-25.
A statement from Rodchenkov’s lawyer, Jim Walden, said the decision from CAS made it “harder for clean athlets to win”.
“Dr. Rodchenkov testified fully and credibly at CAS,” the statement said. “His truth has been verified by forensic evidence, other whistleblowers, and, more recently, recovery of the Moscow lab’s secret database, showing thousands of dirty tests that were covered up.
“This panel’s unfortunate decision provides a very small measure of punishment for some athletes but a complete ‘get out of jail free card’ for most. Thus, the CAS decision only emboldens cheaters, makes it harder for clean athletes to win, and provides yet another ill-gotten gain for the corrupt Russian doping system generally, and Putin specifically.”
