Home > Other Fun Stuff > Uncategorized

Lance Armstrong a ‘Person of Interest’ in Growing Federal Doping Investigation

6 Comments
Support us! Bikerumor may earn a small commission from affiliate links in this article. Learn More

The AP reports that Lance Armstrong is a “person of interest” in the federal doping investigation that’s slowly but surely heading toward a Federal Grand Jury Hearing.

Where it goes after the initial hearing is anyone’s guess, but Armstrong’s former teammates George Hincapie and Tyler Hamilton have been contacted, as have his primary sponsors Trek Bicycles and Nike, both of whom are said to be cooperating.

The lead investigator is none other than Jeff Novitzky, who is credited with uncovering baseball’s steroid era via the BALCO investigation and sending Marion Jones to prison and landed perjury charges against Barry Bonds.

The case started with an investigation into doping supplies found in a vacant apartment used by Kayle Leogrande of Rock Racing. From there, it blew up on the public scene when Floyd Landis’ emails were leaked to the press and contained accusations against Armstrong and many other top names on the former Postal squad. (for the string of Landis news about this, simply search “Landis” on our website)

The case will proceed slowly. In order to bring in someone with Armstrong’s personality, credibility (no failed drug tests) and wealth, not to mention his pride, all the ducks must be in a row. Hurting the case is that subpoenas are in the hands of known detractors Landis and Greg Lemond, and Landis’ history of denial then coming clean likely won’t play well in front of a jury.

According to one of our buddies over at Outside Magazine, because of some riders’ involvement with the quasi-governmental Post Office, any perjury or transport, sale or use of illegal drugs while receiving money from Postal could mean really big trouble if it violates RICO laws.

Time will tell, and the case could take until next year before it’s even heard in front of the Grand Jury, and that process could take months. Armstrong’s lawyer, Tim Herman, says many of Landis’ claims are beyond the government’s jurisdiction to investigate and involve alleged acts that occurred more than five years ago and in other countries.

At any rate, it’ll be very interesting to see what statements come from so many professional cyclists, many with steller reputations, during the process.

Subscribe
Notify of
guest

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

6 Comments
Oldest
Newest Most Voted
Inline Feedbacks
View all comments
lars63
lars63
13 years ago

Why is this so important? The playing field was “at least even” based on any testing done on the cycling athletes. LA has turned his cycling energy into so much good, and the deep down results of this investigation so minor in importance compared to the good LA’s lightning rod has done for humanity. Give it a rest

FDA Promoter
FDA Promoter
13 years ago

Jeff Novitzky is so celebrated now that he gets his own facebook fanpage. Be a fan! http://www.facebook.com/pages/Jeff-Novitzky/126486110731506

PaulC
PaulC
13 years ago

This kind of junk amazes me. The feds have all the time in the world it seems to looking into sports doping, yet the republicans and dems can’t seem to get their acts together to pass bills and write real legislation. I guess sports doping is more important. Who needs transportation and other infrastructure improvements anyways.

james
james
13 years ago

Look at what you have written: ‘the republicans and dems can’t seem to get their acts together to pass bills and write real legislation’. Unfortunately, they have written bill after bill which have spent our country into economic oblivion, given inequitable distribution of money to states for political reasons and bought out politicians votes (like the so called Cornhusker kickback and Louisianan Purchase to pass health care). Our corrupt, shameful parties might be safer to the country if they spent time on doping just so they do not waste another trillion dollars which are really borrowed from China anyway.

Subscribe Now

Sign up to receive BikeRumor content direct to your inbox.

Subscribe Now

Sign up to receive BikeRumor content direct to your inbox.