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Armageddon for athletes
By Dan Wetzel, Yahoo! Sports
September 24, 2007
'Roids raids
By Josh Peter, Yahoo! Sports
September 24, 2007
An international investigation code-named Operation Raw Deal carried out the last four days could produce the next steroids scandal in sports – and perhaps the biggest yet.
The undercover operation led by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration resulted in the seizure of massive amounts of anabolic steroids from an illegal, underground network and the ability to identify hundreds of thousands of people who received steroids and other substances used by some athletes as performance-enhancing drugs, a DEA spokesman told Yahoo! Sports on Sunday.
Most of the raids took place in the United States, and the DEA called the steroids crackdown the largest in U.S. history. DEA offices in New York and San Diego provided lead guidance during an investigation that resulted in 124 arrests and seizures at 56 labs across the country. Investigators also seized 71 weapons, 27 pill presses, 25 vehicles and three boats, but the coveted item was illegal drugs, and the DEA said it intercepted a staggering quantity.
Also, federal officials are creating a database of names of the people who received steroids, human growth hormone (HGH) and other drugs banned by most sports leagues and athletic associations, DEA spokesman Rusty Payne said.
"I have no information about any athletes yet," Payne said when asked about the names in the database and others implicated in the case. But he acknowledged the possibility of athletes being linked to the investigation that focused largely on steroids, HGH and other drugs being manufactured by Chinese companies and flooding the U.S. market.
"Of course, performance-enhancing drugs are an issue right now," Payne told Yahoo! Sports during a telephone interview. "They're in the news, and they're in the news because there have been athletes that have been tied to them. We know that's what this story is."
Steroids, HGH and other drugs seized in the raids promote muscle growth and speed recovery from injury, and athletes have used them despite the risk of suspensions and permanent bans from sport.
Whether Major League Baseball, the NFL and other sports bodies can gain access to the database and search for athletes who received substances banned by the respective sports organizations will be up to top officials at the Justice Department and DEA, according to Payne.
"Anything is possible," he said.
Typically, DEA investigations focus on drug suppliers and dealers. But now that the DEA has the ability to identify the largest numbers of people who received illegal shipments of drugs during Operation Raw Deal, Payne said, "If you are one of those people, you could get a knock at your door."
U.S. officials enlisted the help of China and eight other countries in an investigation that targeted more than 35 Chinese companies that produce raw materials used to make steroids and HGH, and in some cases finished product, sold illegally on the global underground network, Payne said.
China has emerged as the leading supplier of illicit steroids and HGH since the DEA began targeting Mexico suppliers two years ago. U.S. authorities said the operation that shut down steroids manufacturers in Mexico temporarily cut into the supply in the United States, but Chinese suppliers stepped in.
Last week, Yahoo! Sports obtained documents that showed HGH imported from China was seized in the Signature Pharmacy scandal. High-profile athletes linked to that investigation, launched by the district attorney in Albany County, N.Y., include baseball players Rick Ankiel, Gary Matthews Jr., Troy Glaus and Jay Gibbons; NFL safety Rodney Harrison; boxer Evander Holyfield; and a dozen pro wrestlers.
The role of Chinese companies in supplying steroids to the underground market figures to be sensitive for China considering the country will play host to the 2008 Olympics in Beijing in August. But the investigation could prove even more damaging to the world of sports.
Major League Baseball has scrambled to control recent news leaks of players connected to the Signature scandal. Last week, an arbitration panel upheld the results that showed American cyclist Floyd Landis used synthetic testosterone during his riveting comeback victory in the 2006 Tour de France. And for months, during his successful quest to overtake Hank Aaron as baseball's all-time home run king, Barry Bonds reignited controversy from a steroids scandal that stemmed from a 2003 raid of the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO) that ensnared Bonds and several other well-known athletes.
On Monday, the sports world will learn of the latest potential bombshell. Officials are scheduled to announce details of Operation Raw Deal during news conferences in New York and San Diego.
Investigators hauled in countless bags and boxes loaded with steroids that have a street value potentially exceeding $50 million, Payne said. The stockpile included 11.4 million doses of steroids, which based on the 0.5 milliliter per dose used by the DEA for calculations, amounts to about 570,000 vials that each hold 10 milliliters.
Payne said he had no figures for the amount of HGH and other drugs seized in an operation that involved the Food and Drug Administration, the U.S. Postal Inspection Service, the FBI, the U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement and U.S. National Drug Intelligence Center.
"These buyers are solely motivated by a desire to gain an unfair competitive advantage by using illegal performance-enhancing substances," said Terry Vermillion, Director of the FDA Office of Criminal Investigations, in a statement provided to Yahoo! Sports.
But Payne said rather than catching athletes who use banned drugs, the objective was to stanch the flow of illegal steroids and other drugs into the U.S. Most of the drugs seized in the investigation were cooked up "in filthy conditions with no regard to safety," according to the DEA.
The Internet has emerged as a popular source for those seeking performance-enhancing drugs without the required prescription, prompting Operation Raw Deal to employ a four-pronged strategy. The investigation targeted U.S.-based websites that distribute materials such as conversion kits necessary to turn raw steroid powders into finished product; Internet body building discussion boards that teach individuals how to use, locate, and discreetly purchase steroids; raw material manufacturers and suppliers in China and other countries; and underground steroids labs in the United States, Canada and Mexico.
Other countries involved in the coordinated international crackdown included Belgium, Australia, Germany, Denmark, Sweden and Thailand.
"Operation Raw Deal uncovered a clandestine web of international drug dealers who lurk on the Internet for young adults craving the artificial advantage of anabolic steroids," Karen P. Tandy, the DEA administrator, said in a statement.
In addition to steroids and HGH, the operation targeted Insulin Growth Factor and underground trafficking of ancillary and counterfeit medications. Other drugs seized included cocaine, marijuana, Ecstasy, painkillers, anti-anxiety medications and Viagra.
The DEA lauded Chinese officials for their participation in the effort, but whether China disciplines the manufacturers or discloses information remains to be seen. U.S. officials provided Chinese authorities with information packets about more than 35 Chinese companies that allegedly supplied raw materials for steroids, HGH and other performance-enhancing drugs and are involved in the illicit underground trade around the world. But U.S. officials will withhold the names of those companies in deference to China.
DEA officials said they launched the operation in large part because of health risks in taking drugs that often are mislabeled. The potential side effects include strokes, liver damage and heart disease, experts say.
Though the impact of Operation Raw Deal on sports remains uncertain, the DEA's work is not done when it comes to a crackdown on the illegal trafficking of steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs, Payne said.
"This is not a case with a beginning and an end," he said. "I like to look at it more as an initiative.
"This is a huge initiative."
Armageddon for athletes
By Dan Wetzel, Yahoo! Sports
September 24, 2007
They kicked in doors and seized computers. They raided laboratories in Mexico and operated in China. All around the globe they hauled in evidence and hauled off handcuffed criminals.
Over the past four days, the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration and other federal authorities, in conjunction with nine other countries ranging from Canada to Thailand, unleashed a furious series of raids in "Operation Raw Deal." It was an 18-month effort to curb the global trade of anabolic steroids, human growth hormone and other performance-enhancing drugs.
The DEA is calling it an unmitigated success, their largest steroids enforcement effort ever.
For the world of sports, it represents both the best- and worst-case scenarios in the fight against drug cheats. It is a potential historic breakthrough toward busting the offenders and cleaning up the games, but also a possible Armageddon of worst fears realized considering the scope of what might be discovered. The DEA says that due to the massive amount of evidence collected, they will be able to compile a centralized list and database of all the people linked to the case.
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Not just the dealers and distributors, but everyone who purchased or received even a single shipment of some kind of performance-enhancing drug linked to this investigation in the United States in the last two years.
The list, a DEA spokesperson said, should contain "hundreds of thousands of names."
For the major professional sports organizations such as the National Football League and Major League Baseball that list is both a dream come true and a potential nightmare.
Never before has so much evidence been collected. The list is exponentially longer than anything ever previously compiled. While, undoubtedly, it isn't the complete tally of every American involved in this, it is significant. And since the feds aren't even remotely done with the investigation, the list should grow in time.
The database could become the ultimate tool for the NFL and MLB. The leagues could input the names of players, trainers, team doctors, coaches and so on and see what hits.
Rather than the slow drip of leaked names and individual cases that have come to represent the fight against doping, this could be a tidal wave of busts, one giant cleansing of sport.
While the majority of the names on the federal list will have nothing to do with professional sports – amateur body builders or doctors catering to the elderly – common sense says some will be professional athletes.
How many is the question.
The potential numbers here are staggering, the potential impact difficult to fathom. This isn't a BALCO investigation, the busting of a single California lab which netted a couple dozen athletes yet still rocked sports to its core.
This is far greater. It is an opportunity to find out just how widespread doping is in American sports. Consider baseball: Is it five percent of the 1,500 Major League players? 15 percent? 50 percent? The worst-case scenarios are chilling. This is no longer about whether a handful of top players might get caught, although that alone could be devastating. It's about possibly finding out almost no one is legit.
What the leagues would do with the names and information is up to them. MLB might have trouble punishing anyone. Players deserve a presumption of innocence, retroactive punishments can be difficult and the powerful union likely would argue that receiving a shipment of steroids or HGH does not prove it was used.
The NFL, though, has already established a strict precedent. Its law-and-order commissioner, Roger Goodell, recently suspended New England Patriots safety Rodney Harrison for four games not for failing a drug test, but simply for receiving a batch of HGH. That's known as a non-analytical positive, meaning he was found guilty without scientific proof of use.
If the NFL applies the same standard to every name that comes up, the suspension list could be staggering. One crooked team doctor could crush an entire season.
For Goodell, Selig, Olympics officials and others, pursuing that unknown truth is a mighty risk. But it is a risk they must take if they are to maintain any credibility on doping matters.
There is no choice, nowhere to hide. They can’t blame players unions for stopping them. Even if the government tries to be uncooperative and refuses to share the evidence, there is a clear path to strong-arming them.
Back in 2003, when the feds uncovered the athletes in the BALCO case, the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency made an appeal for the details.
The Justice Department, however, rejected the request, claiming it was privileged information. But USADA, eager to do all it could to send a clean American team to the 2004 Athens Olympics, turned to Arizona Senator John McCain. He subpoenaed the information and handed it over.
If it comes to it, the NFL, MLB and others must do the same, they must take this as seriously as USADA at the first opportunity. McCain is running for President and almost certainly would welcome the significant publicity of championing the cause of cleaning up sports.
If for some reason he doesn't, there assuredly are other politicians who will.
The leagues have long thrown up their hands at trying to police this shady international underworld. They've claimed they are as diligent as possible given their limited resources. But deep down there was a measure of relief at not being able to discover the extent of the doping.
Well, the DEA may have done it for them.
Suddenly, here is the break that the leagues claimed publicly they always wanted, but privately must have feared.
Here comes the truth now, in all its potentially devastating, embarrassing and necessary glory. Hundreds of thousands of names linked to this stuff? How many of them play in the NFL, how many in MLB? How many are Olympians?
There's no excuse now but to find out.
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