Go Nicole !!

lemon63

Excellent Nicole, I hope they listen to you .........
http://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/0/cycling/22392989

DeadCalm

An unbelievable amount of tosh is being spouted over the Spanish decision.

Firstly, the same decision would have been reached in any country which has the slightest regard for civil liberties. Why, for example, in the Armstrong case was it so important for USADA to gather its own evidence and not rely on the evidence collected as a part of the Federal case? For exactly the same reasoning behind the Spanish decision. Evidence gathered as part of a state investigation should never be used in civil proceedings.

Whilst that may not be the case in the UK where civil liberties are something of a joke (we're subjects not civilians after all) the case would never have been brought in the UK in the first place as sports doping is still not a crime in the UK and the British police are too busy fudging statistics on crimes they are assessed on to care about doping in sport.

I don't blame Nicole or Andy Murray or any of the other sports people coming out with this stuff. But that the media (and it seems to me, in particular the BBC) are reporting this without any explanation of the reality of the situation is at best shoddy journalism.

No_Ta_Doctor

DeadCalm wrote:

An unbelievable amount of tosh is being spouted over the Spanish decision.

Firstly, the same decision would have been reached in any country which has the slightest regard for civil liberties. Why, for example, in the Armstrong case was it so important for USADA to gather its own evidence and not rely on the evidence collected as a part of the Federal case? For exactly the same reasoning behind the Spanish decision. Evidence gathered as part of a state investigation should never be used in civil proceedings.

Whilst that may not be the case in the UK where civil liberties are something of a joke (we're subjects not civilians after all) the case would never have been brought in the UK in the first place as sports doping is still not a crime in the UK and the British police are too busy fudging statistics on crimes they are assessed on to care about doping in sport.

I don't blame Nicole or Andy Murray or any of the other sports people coming out with this stuff. But that the media (and it seems to me, in particular the BBC) are reporting this without any explanation of the reality of the situation is at best shoddy journalism.

Nail on the head there.

Everyone would like to know the names, but there is a serious and entirely proper legal block in the way.

lemon63

Here's a link to her full statement regarding the Fuentes trial;
http://www.nicolecooke.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=136:actions-of-operation-puerto-trial-have-consequences&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=18

little ring needed

lemon63 wrote:

Here's a link to her full statement regarding the Fuentes trial;
http://www.nicolecooke.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=136:actions-of-operation-puerto-trial-have-consequences&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=18

Thanks for posting that link. I would have missed it.

Excellent statement. She praises the Spanish police for getting the evidence in the first place Let Spain follow what due process the judge interprets they have. She took 6 weeks to decide so it was not clear cut and that was after 7 years of trying to get the case assembled !

Spain can then live by the consequences. Well done on Coni for sorting out the Italian rider. Well done on Nicole for calling it exactly as it is. Just loved this bit " to ensure that a nation that allows its legal system to act in this manner, to prevaricate for 7 years before denying fair justice, holding to letter above intent, can have no part in hosting any future Olympic Games."

Dead calm have a read before you add to the " tosh"count.

DeadCalm

little ring needed wrote:

lemon63 wrote:

Here's a link to her full statement regarding the Fuentes trial;
http://www.nicolecooke.com/index.php?option=com_content&view=article&id=136:actions-of-operation-puerto-trial-have-consequences&catid=1:latest-news&Itemid=18

Thanks for posting that link. I would have missed it.

Excellent statement. She praises the Spanish police for getting the evidence in the first place Let Spain follow what due process the judge interprets they have. She took 6 weeks to decide so it was not clear cut and that was after 7 years of trying to get the case assembled !

Spain can then live by the consequences. Well done on Coni for sorting out the Italian rider. Well done on Nicole for calling it exactly as it is. Just loved this bit " to ensure that a nation that allows its legal system to act in this manner, to prevaricate for 7 years before denying fair justice, holding to letter above intent, can have no part in hosting any future Olympic Games."

Dead calm have a read before you add to the " tosh"count.

An eloquent and heartfelt plea for justice albeit one that overlooks the fundamental legal issues. As I said in my initial post, I have no issue with the athletes who are aggrieved. My issue is with the media and their jingoistic reporting of this matter.

little ring needed

DeadCalm wrote:

An eloquent and heartfelt plea for justice albeit one that overlooks the fundamental legal issues. As I said in my initial post, I have no issue with the athletes who are aggrieved. My issue is with the media and their jingoistic reporting of this matter.

I am not so sure any of the media have been jingoistic. I think only the comments of Andy Murray were. They were very poorly thought out. I actually think the media have been keeping away from it for fear of being accused of being jingoistic (or for fearing what goes around comes around - none can be blind to the suspicions around team Sky)- look how little comment the story achieved in the Guardian, Telegraph BBC etc. I think this was an excellently thought out case by Cooke. Just think about it. Millar escaped being convicted of any criminal sanction because the French Judge in the Cofodis case said it could not be proven that he had not jumped over the border into Spain in 2001 and 2003 to do his injections. If he had done them in France he would have been convicted. He said he drove into Spain to do them ! So he broke no French law. Case dismissed. Spain had plenty of time to start turning the screw, like they did in France post Festina 1998. They were the home for dodgy sporting practices, which is why Lance and folks set up the Discovery community or Little America in Girona. Back in 2006, Fuentes himself was complaining that only the cyclists were being exposed and yet he treated football stars and tennis players. The Guardia had done a superb job secretly filming his offices. It would be very dumb to think that all the evidence available has been made public. Unless anyone is an expert on the Spanish legal system and can provide a critique of what took the judge 6 weeks to determine, none of us know how far "interpretations" of any specific legislation have been made. The prima facie evidence is not good regarding the blind scales of justice. Certainly it would be naive in the extreme to simply dismiss any criticism of the final legal position via a summative comment to the effect that "the judge is all knowledgeable", which is your argument.

The international authorities don't have any joined up thinking on this. WADA is fairly powerless. It needs a wake up call to be sent to the legislators that they have a long way to go. Spain has been given 15 years since Festina and has failed.

Great call - no Olympics for Madrid. It will certainly focus the minds of the legislators. Imagine 2012 had not taken place and Boris was trying to sort out a bid for 2020 and watching this debacle. He would have a team onto it straight away and advising the PM about toughening up UK legislation. Whether we like it or not London is the Financial Capital of the World and one of the principle reasons for that status is a legal system that works most of the time.

mike6

As has been said many times "The law is an Ass". Not only in Britain, obviously. Can some barrack room lawyer explain how all the other sports people involved are protected by the law, but the cyclists involved were not.

mike6

I love this "Civil liberties" stuff. What about the civil liberties of the other, clean, sportspeople cheated out of victories and winnings/prizes by the cheats?

I dont care what so called clever legal types say, the law should be right and fair. Cheating is not right or fair. Nicole is 100% right.

DeadCalm

little ring needed wrote:

Certainly it would be naive in the extreme to simply dismiss any criticism of the final legal position via a summative comment to the effect that "the judge is all knowledgeable", which is your argument.

Huh? Read what I've written again and explain to me how you can sum up 'my argument' in that way.

It is a basic tenet of civil liberties that evidence gathered by the state cannot be used in civil matters. This applies in many countries (including the USA) and not just Spain. This law ensures that your neighbour who works for the secret services and has access to phone taps cannot initiate an investigation of you under some pretext and use the information against you in some neighbour dispute. This is pretty important if you think about it. Given that this is an important rule it is not particularly surprising that the Spanish judge would reach the decision she did and in fact the same result would have almost certainly occurred in most other democracies so I don't see how Spain can be criticised for coming to such a decision.

As I've said elsewhere, I have no issue with the athletes voicing their frustrations (I too am frustrated) and even campaigning for Spain not to get the Olympics. My issue is with the reporting of the athletes comments by the media. A responsible media ought to be addressing the counter-arguments.

little ring needed wrote:

Whether we like it or not London is the Financial Capital of the World and one of the principle reasons for that status is a legal system that works most of the time.

As someone who used to work in the City until fairly recently, I can assure you that London is no longer the 'Financial Capital of the World' and as an ex-lawyer I can assure you that our legal system is no better than the vast majority of other States.

knedlicky

mike6 wrote:

I dont care what so called clever legal types say, the law should be right and fair.

It’s very easy to say “law should be right and fair” but (as any lawyer or philosopher can better explain than me) it isn’t that easy, nevermind what ideas different countries or cultures might follow.

Often, to an observer or concerned complainant, the law may not be right and fair, and often I’d agree (I’m thinking more of when it goes to overly heavy-handed sentencing, or when investigating authorities hide information to avoid being themselves implicated) but if you disagree, you have to accept current laws and procedures, and work towards a change, not simply ‘have one’s back up’ and at the same time give no constructive suggestion about how to change or deal with things (in this case how to handle the blood bags) - which neither Cooke, Murray, or even now Nadal give, despite their high horses.

Amongst the legal considerations typically influencing ‘fairness’ are (1) whether any action went against relevant rules, (2) whether the action actually achieved any benefit, and (3) whether others behaved the same.
With respect to these three factors, (1) riders who doped through Fuentes never went against any then-Spanish laws (only against UCI’s rules, but that is irrelevant to the criminal court concerning Fuentes, and if UCI were interested in pursuing things, they've had 6-7 years to do so), (2) it would be very hard to establish the Fuentes’ clients actually benefited from doping (even if one thinks it did), and (3) unfortunately the suspicion is that many others behaved the same.

I’m not against finding out dopers from the past (I’d gladly investigate Indurain) and temporarily banning those who still ride and are found guilty, but if you go ahead with such zealousness just to expose those who worked with Fuentes, you are only making scapegoats of them, and also ignoring what might have gone on elsewhere then, or since.

And I’m not sure that those Fuentes’ domestiques actually behaved any worse than many on this forum; there must be lots of people who have ‘fudged’ things in their jobs to have at least achieved a minimum requirement.

I’m happy if many of those who won big races have now been discovered and their results cancelled, which I’d guess we are close to.

little ring needed

You guys are arguing as if the law is absolute. Over on the Puerto thread Dan gave us one of two clues, that indicate it is not. How can one judge decide it is ok to give a sample from a named blood bag to the Italian authorities and another decide that it should not happen ? The second clue is that the judge took 6 weeks after hearing the evidence to determine her verdict.

Dead Clam - your point regarding evidence for civil issues is very well made and we know that Sepp Blater dragged his feet until 2008 before FIFA signed up to the WADA code with certain exemptions for footballers. So even if Spanish footballer A was juicing it up to the max in 2006, he would not be subject to sanctions as per the code. But whose blood is in the bags ? Is it only Spanish Nationals ? Who knows? The Judge doesn't, because she refuses to ask Fuentes that question even though he is quite keen to tell her. As Dan pointed out - the Italian request under civil law failed but that under criminal law passed.

There are plenty of Spaniards on various web sites right now who are livid with the process as well, claiming the legislators pass laws that facilitate corruption. I know nothing about the Spanish legal system so I have no idea if that is true, however, just think about the two judges. One judge is away on holiday and his colleague acts in his absence. Establishment figures stick together and back each other up, that is how the system generally works. Why would the judge who got back from his holiday rescind the decision and go public on his dispute ? We cannot know his motive but it would certainly fuel the fires of those accusing the system of corruption - the guy needed to send a message to his paymasters at the football clubs?

Now going off topic, when confirming FIFAs date of signing up to the code I came across this 2009 story:

"Fifa has continued its demands for a change to the World Anti-Doping Agency's new set of guidelines after its latest executive meeting. World football's governing body believes players should be exempt from testing outside of regular tournaments.

To that there can be only two conclusions. Either the FIFA executive have not got a clue about how the dopers work, or they know exactly how they work.