Patric Arnold charged as manufacturer of Balco drugs!!!

StoneColdNTO

Administrator
Illinois Chemist Is Indicted in BALCO Scandal

By Amy Shipley
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, November 4, 2005; Page E01

Illinois chemist Patrick Arnold supplied anabolic steroids to Victor Conte, the mastermind of the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO) drug scandal that ensnared more than a dozen prominent U.S. and international athletes, federal authorities said in a three-count indictment released yesterday.

Arnold also provided steroids to the coach of the two Greek sprinters who withdrew from the 2004 Summer Olympics in Athens after skipping drug tests, according to the indictment.

Arnold, 39, a highly regarded dietary supplement manufacturer who brought to the market the now-illegal steroid product known as andro (androstenedione), is charged with creating and distributing three steroids designed to avoid detection in standard sport drug screens: norbolethone, DMT (or madol) and THG, the most well-known steroid at the center of the BALCO scandal which is also known as "the clear."

A number of prominent athletes, including baseball players Barry Bonds, Jason Giambi and Gary Sheffield, and sprinters Marion Jones, Tim Montgomery and Kelli White, had ties to BALCO.

Authorities alleged that Arnold sent packages of THG to Conte, a friend in Houston and overseas to Chris Tsekos, the coach of the Greek sprinters Costas Kenteris and Ekaterina Thanou, who were accused by Greek authorities of staging a motorcycle crash to explain their absence from drug tests the night before the Olympic Opening Ceremonies. Their case, which has caused great embarrassment in Greece, is now before the Court of Arbitration for Sport in Lausanne, Switzerland. Federal officials said they found vials of THG, DMT and norbolethone in a storage locker discovered during a Sept., 2003, raid of Conte's lab in Burlingame, Calif., and that Conte referred to Arnold as "the clearman" in e-mails.

"Today's indictment is a direct result of what began as the BALCO investigation and the continuing hard work and dedication of the whole investigative team," IRS-Criminal Investigation Special Agent in Charge, Roger L. Wirth said.

Arnold, who was not in custody yesterday and could not be reached for comment, faces a maximum of 13 years in prison and a fine of $750,000 if convicted on the charges of conspiracy to distribute anabolic steroids, conspiracy to defraud by distributing misbranded drugs and the introduction and delivery of THG into the market. Two others, Conte and Bonds's personal trainer, were indicted in February 2003 on steroid charges in connection with the BALCO scandal.

Conte was sentenced to four months in jail and four months probation as part of a plea deal that was approved last month; trainer Greg Anderson received three months in jail and three months probation.

Authorities said they relied on information from 2002 U.S. Olympic bobsledder Gea Johnson, who described herself as a friend of Arnold's for two or three years, to confirm his identity in a series of postings to a public message board at http://bodybuilding.com in which he boasted of having synthesized steroids since 1991.

Arnold apparently thought he had escaped sanction in connection with the BALCO scandals, writing on the message board Aug. 1, "I have learned that the only crime in selling one of these compounds is a minor FDA violation . . . really, as much as the feds may want to make an example of me, with the way the law is written there is not much that can be done. Certainly they may make a media and political controversy out of it. But I don't care."Arnold's lab was raided by federal investigators in September.

Arnold also said in a June 2001 e-mail to his Houston-based friend Miles Werre, who authorities said admitted making a testosterone-based cream for Conte, that "I am sending you . . . a designer roid dissolved in propylene glycol. The designer stuff is very secret and very potent. It is currently being used by several high profile athletes, some of whom are having phenomenal success in their sports right now."

The indictment from the U.S. Attorney's Office in the Northern District of California also said Conte warned Greek track coach Andreas Linardatos that athletes should stop using THG because authorities had discovered it.

Arnold, who helps run Proviant Technologies in Champaign, Ill., and sells supplements through the Ergopharm line, first gained fame after his andro was used in 1998 by former St. Louis Cardinals slugger Mark McGwire.
 
So, these compounds that he synthesized weren't even scheduled, were they? They were just chemicals that he had made?

No doubt that Patrick Arnold is a very smart man that made some really stupid mistakes. And yes, the feds are obvously working hard to make an example out of this.
 
PS If he goes to jail and has Internet access, then I think we could use him over in the chem forum.
 
JohnnyB said:
Damn, we need to watch what we post

JohnnyB
I know, how embarrasing, right? It becoming public knowledge that you posted over at bodybuilding.com ... you'll never live that one down.
 
krembles said:
Innocent Until Proven Guilty. You Can't Out Fox The Fox. I'm Betting
He'll Walk.
I think you have it the other way around. It's: "guilty, until proven innocent."

Why would anyone handcuff an innocent man/woman?? As soon as they put those cuffs on you; you're guilty.
 
That's bullshit, the drugs weren't even illegal when he sold them, they were similar to other illegal compounds, but shit. What were the 'three counts' he was actually charged with?
 
putin said:
I think you have it the other way around. It's: "guilty, until proven innocent."

Why would anyone handcuff an innocent man/woman?? As soon as they put those cuffs on you; you're guilty.
Might I ask, did you once live in the USSR? Serious question.
 
putin said:
I think you have it the other way around. It's: "guilty, until proven innocent."

Why would anyone handcuff an innocent man/woman?? As soon as they put those cuffs on you; you're guilty.


I see you haven't really studied the civil rights history of your country much...
 
JohnnyB said:
Damn, we need to watch what we post

JohnnyB


Yep, just goes to show that all of the talk of these boards not being on the Feds radar is at the very least a tad bit ignorant.
 
Thats crazy, I had no idea. I have talked with that guy over IM. And I thought 1-Test was the thing that was going to make him famous.
 
selling analogs of a scheduled substance to be used in a manner consistent with the use of the scheduled substance can result in the person being prosecuted under the Federal Controlled Substance Analogue Act. The only thing that might save his ass from being buried is that this law was designed for Schedule I and II stimulants, hallucinogens, and depressants; while testosterone and most derivatives are Schedule III. Since these analogs had no established medical uses by the FDA, the DA could argue that these substances would be considered Schedule I by nature.

If the DEA or IRS wants to make an example of him, it's still going to cost him a small fortune in lawyer fees to be able to walk away from this, and any future supplement business he runs is going to be scrutinized into the ground by the FDA and IRS.
 
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