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The name to remember is Jeff Novitzky. Not to be confused with Dirk Nowitzki, who is a different type of badass entirely.
Novitzky was heavily involved the Balco investigation. More on him here: en.wikipedia.org and nydailynews.com.
Novitzky, the lead investigator in the Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative steroids case, is in charge of the fraud case and is trying to determine whether Armstrong, the owners or managers of his former cycling teams and his teammates had conspired to defraud their sponsors by doping to improve their performances and garner more money and prizes. Specifically, authorities want to know whether money from the Postal Service, the main sponsor of Armstrong’s team from 1996 to 2004, was used to buy performance-enhancing drugs.
In the Balco investigation, the authorities initially targeted those who dealt and sold the performance-enhancing drugs — not the end users. Nearly all the people who have admitted to crimes and cooperated with Novitzky have avoided prison time. Only those athletes thought to have lied under oath have been charged.
Read the rest: nytimes.com. (Link is to page two of two, where the quote resides. Page one is here).
This guy means business. And he is not going away any time soon.
George Hincapie (BMC) and Tyler Hamilton are among the riders who have been asked to cooperate with the federal investigation into doping practices in American cycling at large and the US Postal Service team in particular, according to the Wall Street Journal.
The criminal investigation, led by Food and Drug Administration (FDA) special agent Jeff Novitzky, is focused principally around Floyd Landis’ recent allegations of systematic doping practices at the US Postal Service team.
Read the rest: cyclingnews.com.
The article does a good job of laying out the issue at hand. This is going to be a very big deal for people like Johan Bruyneel.
Meanwhile, it is also reported that Tyler Hamilton is among the riders who has been approached by Novitzky. Hamilton rode for US Postal from 1995 to 2001, and was in 2004 the first rider to test positive for the type of blood doping outlined in Floyd Landis’ allegations.
Hamilton responded by e-mail to Wall Street Journal reporters’ questions, saying “I am aware that there is an investigation of other people in progress, and if I am subpoenaed to provide information, I will provide my full cooperation.”
The US Postal Service team was essentially funded by the American taxpayer. Therefore, any evidence that such money was used in a fraudulent manner, such as to implement a systematic doping programme, could have serious repercussions, particularly for those in positions of authority. Id.
Bruyneel may be used to a somewhat laissez-faire approach to doping rule enforcement (i.e., throwing money at a problem to make it go away). But, this is going to be different. I do not expect an rapid explosion of revelations followed by as seemingly endless slog across a muddy field of play, like we saw in Operación Puerto. This will be more of a slow boil, as information is gathered and organized through interviews and depositions. It will come to a head eventually. And when it does, it is going to be very interesting.
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…jeff novitzky…the dog who’s determined to find that buried bone…more power to him…
…dunno where your knowledge of this kind of law extends to, gianni but perhaps you can find a source to enlighten us on the issue…
…it would seem to my layman’s mind that proving “that such money was used in a fraudulent manner, such as to implement a systematic doping programme” because “The US Postal Service team was essentially funded by the American taxpayer.” would be hard to draw a direct binding legal correlation that would stand up in court…
…it’s not like bruyneel would a’ been signing over two party checks from the ‘g‘ to buy the goods…
…but i do hope novitzky can find enough to not only substantiate landis’s claims but to “blow the doors off the muthafucka”…& i don’t mean for just one guy…we need to hear the truth from everybody involved in that era…
“The US Postal Service team was essentially funded by the American taxpayer.”
The USPS is NOT funded by the taxpayers. Its surprising that even so-called legitimate news sources get this wrong. The USPS has not received money from the taxpayers since the 1960’s. It is an “independent agency of the US Govt.”
pleez nigga say what? 2day you talking conspiracy theories of all dayz??i spent all night with some of the finest cooch in West Chester PA USA http://www.cyclingnews.com/races/iron-hill-criterium-ne-1/results, woke fine and refreshed 10ish in time to see,in real time,the end of Lancey pants (latest) athletic ego trip.Johann don’t crash my buzz w/excuses/The King is Dead Long Live The…,wait, nevermind
Tyler left USPS in ’01 and got popped in ’04. 1000 days passed…
I’m not naive, nor dumb, enough to say that LA and his gang didn’t dope, but hearsay and conjecture are very easy to refute. Unless someone brings a paper trail, a receipt or a video of LA, GH or DZ banging up a bag of blood, this will just be another empty investigation that goes around in circles.
true
same with the IRS thanks to the Rockefeller and friends in the 20’s
What good is rehashing something that happened six years ago going to do? It sure isn’t going to help cycling. Most of the guys named are at the end of there careers. I don’t get what the haters think will be gained by this. I don’t like cheaters just as much as the next guy, but sometimes is best to move on. i’d like to think that doping has been clean up for the most part.
Dearest leadmoto: Yeah, why dwell on the past, like with the Nazi’s. Obviously, we’ve learned from that, and moved on. Genocide is part of life. They are all dead now. I mean, c’mon, the Jews are such haters! Six years is such a long time. I mean with your historical perspective, where does it all go fuzzy for you? The sixties?
Boom. Godwin’s Law rears it’s ugly head. And that right soon.
I bet Tyler will sing like a castrato choir boy.
Leadmoto – many of the guys from that team, and that era, are still racing. And how much longer are we going to have to hear “the sport is better now… it’s clean now?” We heard it in ’99 and every year following as the testing became more stringent. It isn’t clear at all that any lesson has been learned. Digging up the dirt on this particular issue also makes it clear to new riders that A) in the future, their past misdeeds can/will be investigated and that could be further deterrent. 2) provides further reassurance/encourage to new riders who wish to RaceClean that the sport is committed to cleaning up and staying clean. In this way, it WILL help cycling. And I think most of us have had enough swept under the rug.
Clean cycling is an oxymoron and goes against the long history and lore of the sport. The sport you loved has never been clean.
The legends doped and they achieved greatness because of it.
I am with kg on this. There’s a long history of doping in cycling. Strengthen the rules to catch dopers. Fine. I support that, but if they’re better than the system and the tests then let is stand (as some always have been) Your heroes doped. Simpson died because he was taking speed on Ventoux. Merckx doped. Popped a few times. Didn’t Alexi Grewal take ephedrine to win the 84 Olympic gold? Lemond… Indurain… doped. I’m sure of it. They had their “programs”, they stopped winning when they wouldn’t get on the most modern programs (lead poisoning my ass…) You can’t tell me that the 90’s and early 00’s cycling wasn’t the most exciting to watch. Vino was great to watch. Strong like bull, smart like tractor… They’re doping today. They’ve just gotten better at it. Don’t fool yourself into thinking there’s anything clean about the upper echelon of cycling. Never has been. Never will be. I still love it.
… let “it” stand…
“Those who don’t know history are destined to repeat it.”
– Edmund Burke
It’s a bike race.
Thanks to all who posted logical reply’s.
Here is what’s up. It is called Karma bitches. LA and Toolneel may or may not pay the piper on Fed charges for USPS, I could care less about that. What I care about is that LA and Co. perpertrated the biggest fraud in sporting history and must pay in both $ and image. The shit makes the Chicago Black sox look like choir boys. I want Lance to go down for his arrogance and shameless extortion of those that have loved ones with Cancer. I want him to feel what he made the Mike Anderson’s, The Kristen Armstrong’s, the Simeoni’s, and yes even the Landis and Hamiltons. The audacity to defame others as crazy and say they wrote books extorted etc. when your whole image is a fraud. LA, you should have quit when you had the chance at the 98′ Paris – Nice. You chose to keep on and now you should pay like everyone else that has lost.
Make no mistake, Tyler will sing. George will sing, Zabriskie will sing, CVV will sing. Novitsky is good, and like we said when this shit began….let it all burn down.
I have mixed emotion, I love cycling, and its all silly, but watching a crazy eyed Landis stomp the field or Grewal beat Bauer that was some entertaining TV… fuck NASCAR or football or baseball: I like bikes! Not a big fan of tax men (Novisky). The police should enforce the law not the tax man.