RMTC
By: Matt Hegarty
Bill Mott, the Hall of Fame trainer, has filed a federal lawsuit against the New York State Gaming Commission, its officers, and officials with the state’s drug-testing lab, claiming that he was denied due-process rights to defend himself against an accusation that he had two therapeutic overages in the same horse last year, according to a copy of the suit.
The suit seeks to overturn a 15-day suspension handed down by the gaming commission after a horse trained by Mott, Saratoga Snacks, tested positive for overages of two therapeutic medications, the anti-bleeding drug furosemide and the painkiller flunixin, following a last-place finish in an allowance race at Belmont Park on Sept. 20, 2014. In the suit, Mott’s attorney, Drew Mollica, claims that the gaming commission denied Mott due process by failing to provide a split sample of the horse’s blood so that the concentrations of the drugs could be verified by a second lab, along with testing to determine whether the sample came from Saratoga Snacks.
Mott appealed the suspension earlier this year, claiming that the high concentrations of the drugs in the blood sample could not have been produced from a sample from Saratoga Snacks. The concentrations of furosemide and banamine were both 10 times the permissible levels allowed by New York’s medication rules.
The suit seeks to have the suspension vacated as well as the award of attorney’s fees.
