The U.S. Anti-Doping Agency has spent more than $2.1 million on 15 cases connected to the steroids scandal surrounding the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO), the agency's chief said yesterday.
The costs, most of which went to legal fees and cover the period between June 5, 2003, and Nov. 30, 2004, were substantially higher than anticipated, Terry Madden, the USADA chief executive, said in a telephone interview.
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Though 12 of the cases against prominent track and field athletes have been concluded with sanctions, three have not been resolved, ensuring that USADA's BALCO tab will continue to rise, Madden said. He also said the agency would bring further charges if necessary as the federal steroid distribution case involving BALCO, a San Francisco area nutritional supplements company, unfolds.
"This is the type of concentrated effort and resources needed to find drug cheats and remove them from sport," Madden said. "USADA will continue to focus on the BALCO case and see it to its conclusion."
The fact that a U.S. agency is spending so much money on the fight against doping in sports doesn't hurt the credibility of the United States abroad in an area it was once considered sorely lacking. However, the expenditure also highlights the rising cost of fighting the battle against performance-enhancing drugs in sports, raising questions about whether it is worth it and whether other countries with fewer resources are making the same effort.
USADA, which began operations in the fall of 2000, is funded by the U.S. government and the U.S. Olympic Committee, with the government covering about 60 percent of costs. It is a non-profit corporation whose stated mission is to eliminate drug use in sport and protect athletes' health through research and education.
BALCO founder Victor Conte Jr. and three other men were indicted last year on federal steroid distribution charges. All have pled not guilty. Their cases could go to trial this year.
The BALCO costs represent more than twice that spent on legal fees by USADA for all cases in 2002, before the BALCO scandal broke. According to the agency's 2002 annual report, 33 athletes received sanctions on a variety of matters and legal costs totaled $1.03 million.
Madden said USADA spent $1.785 million on legal expenses and $315,000 on research and science related to the BALCO cases. The expenditures accounted for 11.4 percent of USADA's $18.45 million budget over that 18-month period.
Madden, who produced the figures in response to a request from The Washington Post, said the numbers were estimates based on an internal review. He said two external audits of USADA for 2004 were scheduled to begin this week.
The drug agency has received some criticism, particularly from athletes facing BALCO charges and their attorneys, for its forceful approach to the scandal. Critics note that four of the 15 athletes USADA officials brought charges against did not test positive for any banned substances. USADA's cases against those athletes rely on evidence seized in a 2003 federal raid of BALCO that was furnished by the government.
Sprint superstar Marion Jones, who has been the subject of a USADA investigation but has not been charged, called USADA a "secret kangaroo court" last spring. She accused USADA of dragging her name through the mud when the agency did not respond to pleas to exonerate her publicly.
The International Olympic Committee has since opened its own investigation into Jones's connection to BALCO.
Madden said USADA had a responsibility to pursue the BALCO matter and would continue to do so. Jim Scherr, the chief executive of the USOC, said last week that USADA had been respectful of athletes' rights and had "done a very good job given the challenges they faced as a startup organization related to the BALCO matter."
USADA's foray into the BALCO scandal began in June of 2003, when an anonymous coach -- later revealed to be track coach Trevor Graham -- sent USADA a syringe containing a steroid that Olympic drug-testing methods could not detect.
USADA sent the syringe to Don Catlin of the UCLA Olympic Analytical Laboratory in Los Angeles, kicking off the research and science expenditures of $315,000.
Catlin analyzed the substance and determined that it was a brand-new steroid that is now known as THG. Federal prosecutors alleged in their indictment last year that THG was among several drugs distributed by BALCO to athletes.
USADA sponsored research into THG, which included work at the National Analytic Reference Laboratory in Canberra, Australia, and at Southwest National Primate Research Center in San Antonio. In San Antonio, baboons ingested THG so its profile in urine tests could be observed.
Two cases filed in federal court that challenged the validity of USADA's designated system of arbitration alone cost the agency $250,000, according to Madden. USADA won the motions filed by Edward Williams, the attorney for track athletes Regina Jacobs and Calvin Harrison, but the cases dragged on for months.
The remaining $1.535 million in legal expenses went toward hearing fees, outside council and expert testimony for the other 13 cases.
