Dees2014

3-6 months maybe as a guess

Further to my previous post about australian Olympic athletes attitudes to the ESSENDON saga, where these links didn't work, I think they will now. Even though the articles aren't the latest, they do demonstrate the one rule for the wealthy and another for the also rans. Not everyone agrees with ABBOTT and Hird, thank goodness. I particularly like the last one. Absolutely spot on if you ask me. Says it all, and particularly says why there is no way known that these guys can get off in the face of CAS if everyone is treated equally globally, which is what WADA's job is. http://www.theage.com.au/afl/afl-news/essendon-saga-shows-we-need-to-change-protocol-20130831-2sxoy.html http://www.therunningreview.com/2013/06/19/athlete-qa-tamsyn-lewis-manou/ http://www.heraldsun.com.au/news/opinion/play-it-straight-and-take-the-medicine/story-fni0fhh1-1226703731898

Macca, as always anything is possible, but on the balance of probabilities Essendon look like losing. I personally dont think any legal outcomes in Australia will have the least bit influence on the judgements by CAS. They are very different legal systems, and in any case i know for a fact that WADA are APPALLED by Essendon's actions. Let's see what happens. but i know who i would prefer to back.

Sorry, your May need to paste the URL into your internet explorer. It worked for me by double clicking initially, but not now. They are worth reading.

For those of you who think Essendon are hardly done by, I urge you to read these article: Olympic athletes are rightly seriously [censored] off, and so they should be. I think it puts it all into perspective actually. http://www.theage.co...0831-2sxoy.html http://www.heraldsun...1-1226703731898 http://www.therunnin...yn-lewis-manou/

They are not on their website because their official involvement has not started yet. That will not happen until their local affiliate, ASADA, has completed their role in this ie the appeal against the not guilty verdict to the AFL appeals tribunal. After that is handed down , and I have no doubt that will be "not guilty" also (unless the AFL decides they might be able to get away with a light sentence from the AFL Appeals Tribunal and avoid CAS - fat chance!), then WADA has 21 days to appeal to CAS. It is then their role will become official. That is not to say they are not involved in an informal way with the ASADA strategy. I would expect them to be intimately involved in that.

Under the WADA code as applied by CAS, the offence does not need to be proven. It is up to the defendants to prove their innocence as under most European law.. A far harder hurdle to jump over, particularly in Essendon's and Hird's case, because the circumstantial case is so strong, and there is no objective test (at least for the time being) to prove it one way or the other. ASADA knows this, WADA knows this, Hird, Essendon and the AFL know this. That is why the PR campaign has been cranked up several notches since the initial decision in a desperate attempt to keep the case out of CAS. Once a guilty verdict comes in from CAS, then the floodgates really will open up: from Worksafe, from the players effected, from officials. The court cases will go on for years.

I suspect Essendon as a whole, and club officials like James Hird, will be charged when the case against the players is completed, but with Essendon it is likely to coincide with the initial findings from Worksafe Victoria. Combined I have no doubt this will be followed by a series of writs.

And the global head of News Corporation is a former Melbourne boy, and an Essendon fanatic, and one of the principle sources of business pressure in this campaign.

Sorry but rubbish. ASADA have been subject to a lengthy and extremely expensive PR campaign designed amoungst other things to discredit it and get it to back off. And when it didn't, they have arranged a media whispering campaign which can be summed up as "isn't it time to move on?" "Enough is enough". And you know what? It has nearly worked. How do I know? Because I have have been involved in corporate PR campaigns in a number of parts of the world at senior levels, and I know exactly what techniques are used. It ranges from using governments to denude them of resources when they were under most demand for their services as both the Gillard and Abbott governments have done and then pronounce them as incompetent; arranging for "credible" public figures to pronounce on various aspects of the investigation eg Abbott, Alan Jones ( not that he is credible, but he is influential), Andrews, numerous media people - effectively saying ASADA is incompetent when they clearly are not (if you don't believe me ask WADA who regard them along with USADA as the best country affiliates they have); tying up the investigations in the courts and then criticising it for taking so long; destroying evidence, and then pleading innocence; organising bipartisan political pressure, and I don't only mean political parties - the pressure has come from certainly politicans, but also parts of business, unions, senior media people, even state governors; organising "fronts" made up of seemingly dispassionate people but funded and coached by the campaign; identifying tame "academics" who are sympathic to the cause, and them placing them as unbiased "expertise" to give "dispassionate" analysis in general news items; orgaising sympathic academics to write "dispassionate" studies and have these publicised as news as though they are objective and credible. It has been an organised, extremely cynical but very professional and clever campaign. Many of these same techniques are used by big tobacco, and are currently been used by the fossil fuel industry to discredit climate science, as well as the mining industry to destroy thoroughly legitimate resources taxes. They were also used by Armstrong in the US against USADA - it took four years with the help of WADA to eventually catch him, but catch him they did, and there were very many red faces as a result. We are very fortunate that we have people like McDevitt, who have the experience, knowhow and the balls to stand up to these people, and he also knows at the end of the day that if all else fails, WADA can come over the top of all this and be the incorruptible umpire. Sometimes, just sometimes, the "good guys" win, and they will here.

Let's be crystal clear about this. WADA has been intimately involved in this case from the beginning. It is significant that McDevitt at his press conference made a point of saying he had a lengthy telephone conference with them on Tuesday night following the bringing down of the initial verdict. This presumably was not to talk about the weather! My guess is that WADA and ASADA have had a long term strategy worked out for sometime and the moves in the last day or so are just the initial skirmishes in that strategy. I have said for sometime this will eventually go to CAS, and it will. WADA is the only organisation which can take it there.

That is the thing that most people here fail to understand. The precedence with WADA and CAS has already been firmly set, and that precedence will find ESSENDON and their players firmly guilty. There have been numerous far less serious cases go through CAS than this, and have come out the other side as guilty. This will be no different. But don't expect any change from the AFL appeals tribunal, the AFL has them firmly under control. It will need to get to CAS for there to be any change.

No it is not the end of story. McDevitt, one of Australia's most senior cops, and a Supreme Court judge both look at the evidence in detail and concluded differently. The AFL tribunal was set up to come to these conclusions. It will be an entirely different matter when they are reviewed by an entirely objective forum ie CAS - free from political and sporting body interference, and media pressure.

Only 30% of sportspeople convicted by WADA/ASADA have actually had a positive test. Strong circumstantial evidence is enough to convict in a CAS court, and they have on numerous occasions upheld appeals on exactly those grounds. I suspect you are pointing the finger at me when you talk about conspiracy theorists. I do not believe there was a conspiracy as such. What I do believe is that the AFL implemented the tried and true bureaucratic method of getting the result that they wanted by appointing people to the tribunal who agreed with them. Abbott uses it all the time in Canberra: think Winshuttle (a known climate denier) enquiry into the clean energy quotas, Wilson's (ex IPA DIRECTOR) appointment as human rights commissioner. If you appoint people who agree with you, you almost always get the result you want. To that extent the AFL manufactured the result.

But you can bet this issue will be front and centre for ASADA and WADA as they prepare their case for appeal to the Appeals tribunal, and then CAS.

WADA plays by different rules. No records will not be accepted at CAS. This seems to have been totally lost in all this post tribunal discussion. I think it is significant that the Hird and Essendon publicity machine, since the initially Tribunal findings have come out, have switched their attack to mounting a case against ASADA taking further action as effectively "a further waste of taxpayers' money". They seem to be saying ASADA should not appeal because it will cost money. No mention of whether it is the right thing to do or not. Since when have the authorities taken decisions on prosecutions on the basis it will cost the taxpayers further money? It is always on the basis on whether the culprit on the basis of probabilities has broken the law. That is what ASADA's role is, and fortunately MCDevitt does not seem to be the sort of person who is likely to be cowed by this sort of pressure. He appears to be someone who has seen this all before. Fortunately also, WADA actions are outside the politically charged atmosphere of Australia where Hird's publicity machine has no effect and judgements at CAS are made from a different set of criteria. It is not a presumption of innocent until proven guilty. At CAS, you actually have to prove your innocence. Without records, and very strong circumstantial evidence of illegal drug taking, they are very unlikely to be given the benefit of the doubt. There are numerous instances where CAS have enforced judgements in very similar circumstances. Innocence has to be proven eg you cannot avoid a drug test by simply not turning up. You get banned. By not keeping records, then claiming innocence, when ASADA has proved that illegal drugs were supplied to Essendon in very large quantities, amounts to the same thing. In CAS's view, IMHO you will get banned also. I have said all along that I believe ultimately this will be decided by CAS as a result of an appeal by WADA. I note that during Mc Devitt's Press Conference yesterday that he said he is in regular contact with WADA, including a conversation on Tuesday night following the ruling. I have no doubt they are preparing to take this all the way until they get the decision they think is just. This still has a number of steps to go.

Have a look at mcDevitt's presser

The AFL appeals tribunal will come to the same conclusion. CAS won't though....

The game is far from over. It has to get past ASADA appeal and then WADA. I have no doubt WADA will appeal, and win in CAS which operates under a very different basis. A technicality won't cut it there.

I never said the AFL were corrupt. Just self interested and will pull every lever available to them to get the outcome they want. As Hird and Essensdon will. That doesn't mean they should get away with it though.

As I understand it that is the process yes. One step at a time and all that. Generally WADA relies on their local affiliate to execute, when this is exhausted and they believe the code has not been properly enforced, then they take it to CAS.

Guys I'm back.... I read some of the stuff on here and couldn't help myself from commenting. First can I say, yesterday's result was totally predictable. I predicted it many times in previous posts. It is the first step in a number we are about to go through. By the way I have previously said there is no way the an AFL Tribunal will find in favour of ASADA. The AFL is not going to allow their own tribunal to shoot them in the foot, in spite of their protestations of independence. It has always been and always will be a tribunal,under the control of the AFL. Last time I wrote that in here there were howls of outrage that I would dare to impune the integrity of the former judges on the panel, who are paid two or three times more by the AFL than they would have been as judges. Of course they are going to find in favour of their employers, and meet the enormous political pressure from all sides just wishing this would go away. It will not. The next step is that ASADA will appeal to the AFL appeals tribunal - a bit like soviet dissident appealing to the soviet Central committee. Nothing will come of it, which means WADA will step in and take it to CAS. This may take several months but it will happen. We just need to be patient.

Bye

You won't hear from me again. It seems DL are quite happy to censor me if I have a complaint from my point a view on reasonable grounds. I wish you guys all the best. Go dees.