Jock Paget cleared

New Zealand eventer Jock Paget has today been cleared by the FEI Tribunal of any wrong-doing in relation to his horse Clifton Promise last year failing an equine anti-doping test.

In early June, Paget faced the Tribunal in London to present his evidence. Immediately after the hearing, the Tribunal unusually lifted his provisional suspension pending the release of its final ruling. Paget has since competed at several events in the UK.

Key to the case was that the person responsible (Paget) prove to the Tribunal how the banned substance reserpine came to be in the horse, and demonstrate no fault or negligence for its presence. Paget has maintained his innocence throughout.

The final ruling of the Tribunal has been released today and confirms that the positive finding came as the result of contamination of an equine supplement during its manufacture, and for which Paget bore no responsibility.

In acknowledging that top level equestrian sport requires “the use of supplements to properly care for such elite horses”, the Tribunal highlighted that Clifton Promise had been tested clean on four previous occasions dating back to 2010 when using the same supplement including at Badminton in May 2013.

“The Tribunal therefore believes that the PR (Paget) had the right to rely on the product, and in particular to expect that the product did not contain any Prohibited Substances.”

The ruling concludes that “the Tribunal finds that the PR has succeeded in establishing that he bears No Fault or Negligence for the rule violation” and that “The Tribunal is not imposing any sanctions on the PR”.

Equestrian Sports New Zealand president Chris Hodson QC welcomed the ruling.

“It is very important to the reputation of equestrian and New Zealand sport that no athlete should be knowingly involved in any act of doping. That Jock Paget has proved his innocence, which requires a very high standard which has only been achieved in one previous case, is intensely satisfying, and fully justifies the support which ESNZ has given him throughout.”

Mr Hodson also reaffirmed ESNZ’s ongoing and active support of FEI Clean Sport and World Anti-Doping Agency programmes.

Paget is hugely relieved to put his horror 10 months behind him.

“I feel as though I had my career stripped from me and now someone has said ‘hang on, you can have it back’. It is complete relief,” he said.

“I didn’t know if I would be cleared, despite knowing I had done nothing wrong. I knew it wouldn’t be as easy as turning around and saying ‘I didn’t do it’. I was fortunate that we were able to find the source of the contamination, trace it and prove it, and – most importantly – that I wasn’t responsible nor could have known.”

Paget said the support he had received from sponsors, owners, his team-mates, staff, family, friends, Equestrian Sports New Zealand and his legal team at Burges Salmon had been invaluable.

Clifton Promise returned a positive test for the banned substance reserpine after winning the Land Rover Burghley International Horse Trials in September. The subsequent B sample confirmed the positive analysis. As a result, Paget was disqualified from Burghley, a decision which will remain as there was no challenge to the presence of the banned substance.

Today’s decision clears the way for Paget and Clifton Promise to compete at the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games in France later this month. The combination was provisionally named in the New Zealand team for the four-yearly world championships, pending the final ruling.

Notes 1 - Timeline:

Notes 2 – Technical Explanations:

1. Reserpine has been on the FEI Prohibited Substances List since 2004.
2. The FEI has been testing for the presence of reserpine in samples from this date with five previous positive cases since 2006.
3. It is understood that the FEI’s testing of samples involves screening for over two thousand different substances, one of which is reserpine.
4. Clifton Promise had been tested four times, all negative, previously during the period that he had been using the relevant product (LesstressE) including at Badminton 2013. There was no reserpine detected on these previous occasions because the product was not contaminated with reserpine at those times.
5. The FEI Tribunal has determined that, on the balance of probabilities, the positive test at Burghley was caused by an accidental contamination of the product at the manufacturer.
6. The amount of reserpine found in Clifton Promise’s sample was 70 pictograms/ml or 70 trillionths of a gram (0.000000000007 grams); a tiny trace approximately equivalent to three and a half drops of water in an Olympic-sized swimming pool.
7. The FEI Tribunal has ruled that Jonathan Paget bears ‘No Fault or Negligence’ for the positive test based on its findings that the cause was the LesstressE product, that the reserpine in the product was the result of unforeseen contamination at the manufacturer, that Paget could not have known that the product was contaminated and that, given the precautions Paget had taken, he had the right to rely on the product and to expect it not to contain any prohibited substances.
8. The Tribunal has judged that Paget has met the exceptionally strict requirements enabling it to rule that there has been No Fault or Negligence; Paget is therefore exonerated from wrong doing.