By Gareth Messenger
May 2 – The doctor at the centre of Spain’s biggest doping scandal has been handed a one-year suspended sentence after being found guilty of endangering public health. But the big winners in the case are the alleged dopers from sports other than cycling, and including football, who will retain their anonymity.
Eufemiano Fuentes was handed a 12-month suspended prison sentence and banned as a sports doctor for four years after being given a guilty verdict. He will also pay a fine of €15 per day for the next 10 months and his four-year ban applies to any inclusions of sport medicine – although his suspension will not stop him from continuing in general practice.
Fuentes has been at the centre of the storm after being officially charged when police found steroids and 200 bags of blood on his premises back in 2006. Fuentes has admitted working with other sports people, including footballers, but an investigation was never undertaken outside of cycling. Along with his co-defendants Yolanda Fuentes, Manolo Saiz, Vicente Belda and Ignacio Labarta, Fuentes has offered to reveal his full list of clients, however Judge Julia Patricia Santamaria revealed on Tuesday that the contents will be destroyed in the near future.
It is known that a large number of athletes, particularly in cycling, have used Fuentes and his facilities to dope, but the decision to rid of the evidence has riled the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) who can no longer punish the guilty athletes.
In 2006, Fuentes admitted he worked alongside footballers and tennis players; however he was never investigated outside of cycling. In February this year, former Real Sociedad president Inaki Badiola admitted that his club paid Fuentes over €300,000 per year for PEDs between 2001 and 2007 revealing, “For six years, La Real paid for medicines and products in illegal money that at the time were catalogued as doping products and for this reason were obtained on the black market.”
At the end of March this year, Fuentes claimed that La Liga giants Real Madrid owed him money, a claim which Madrid swiftly denied with the club later stating: “Facing the attempt by Fuentes to mislead, clearly with bad intention, public opinion regarding the nature of his relationship with the club Real Madrid are going to take immediate legal action against Fuentes.”
In 2008, Fuentes reportedly showed Le Monde journalist Stephane Mandard records of players from Real Madrid, Barcelona, Real Betis, Sevilla and Valencia with detailed doping plans for the season. Both Barcelona and Real Madrid sued and Mandard was ordered to pay €15,000 in damages because he could not provide the documentation to support his claim. Le Monde had to pay €300,000.
One of the witnesses in Madrid’s legal battle against Mandard was Eufemiano Fuentes, and the club was quick to dismiss any links to doping by Fuentes when he claimed the Madrid outfit owed him money just over a month ago. Real explained: “In the action brought by Real Madrid against Le Monde, the club did ask Fuentes to act as a witness against the false information published by the paper suggesting a contract existed between Fuentes and the club to treat players. He has always denied that he had any relation with the club.”
Spanish sport’s reputation has become tarnished through the act of sports medicine, and while Fuentes admitted at the start of 2013 that footballers were among his clients, if the appeals against the blood bags being kept are ignored, then the players or clubs who he worked for could never come to light.
Contact the writer of this story at moc.l1734799061labto1734799061ofdlr1734799061owedi1734799061sni@r1734799061egnes1734799061sem.h1734799061terag1734799061. Gareth is Editor-in-Chief, www.laliganews.tv @G_Messenger