Sun Yang’s defence team roasted by dilemma presented by WADA’s anti-doping crusaders
Sun Yang’s defence rests on the premise that the testers were not properly credentialled but if they’re wrong, China’s greatest ever swimmer faces a ban of up to eight years, effectively ending his career.
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The three arbitrators that will decide Sun Yang’s fate were left to ponder a dilemma that his defence team just couldn’t answer but really needed to.
While Sun’s lawyers argued that he should be cleared of any wrongdoing because they insisted the three independent drug testers were not properly credentialled, that left them in a pickle as one of the arbitrators, British law professor Philippe Sands pointed out.
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First, he asked them did the doctors who advised Sun to destroy his samples before they could be tested realise the consequences if they were wrong.
Then he asked if they were aware of the consequences if they were right, because the repercussions of both scenarios are enormous.
If they are wrong and the panel agrees with the World Anti-Doping Agency that the testers were properly authorised, Sun faces a ban of up to eight years, effectively ending his career.
“How do you put your case if you are wrong on the question of accreditation?” Sands asked Sun’s lead counsellor.
“Or, is it the case that your entire submissions are based on the accreditation point?
“Because if they are, it is hard to see how you make a case.”
The FINA Panel that initially investigated Sun warned him it was a “foolish gamble” and WADA’s anti-doping crusader lawyer Richard Young strongly refuted the notion that the testers were not properly credentialled, saying the same paperwork that had been used in over 64,000 other tests, including 180 on Sun, where there had never been a single complaint.
WADA’s deputy director Stuart Kemp gave a compelling testimony on why the testers were fine to carry out their duties, saying the instructions were guidelines rather than enforceable rules so they hadn’t breached any protocols, while Young explained that the regulations were clear cut because they were designed to close any loophole allowing athletes to miss tests.
“Here’s the bottom line,” said Young, the same man who helped bring down sport’s biggest cheat Lance Armstrong.
“Doped athletes facing the alternative perils of a positive test on the one hand and the refusal failure on the other and must be incentives to provide a sample otherwise they will be encouraged to follow the Sun Yang playbook and decide not to provide a sample and relying on whatever defences they can come up at the time and the weeks following.”
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That brought the panel to the second, about the consequences if Sun was in the right.
If that were decided, it could mean that tens of thousands of tests that other athletes had willingly agreed to with the same paperwork could be in question, a scenario no one could provide an answer to.
Originally published as Sun Yang’s defence team roasted by dilemma presented by WADA’s anti-doping crusaders