Doctor Emmett Brown would be proud. The International Olympic Committee (IOC) has gone back to the future.
The IOC, that bastion of ethical behavior, has decided to strip Marion Jones of her gold medal in the 100m at the 2000 Sydney Olympics for doping violations. Fine. I have no problem with that. We would assume, then, that silver medalist would now be awarded the gold.
Not so fast.
The problem is that the silver medalist was Greek sprinter Katerina Thanou, who was accused of dodging drug-testers in Athens and faking a motorcycle crash as a cover-up. Yes, that's right: in Athens. That was four years after Sydney, at the 2004 Olympic games.
So, to recap: Thanou never tested positive at the 2000 Sydney games (the games in which she received the silver), was not linked to doping allegations there, was not stripped of her silver medal there, but is being punished for admittedly shady behavior that happened four years later? And she was already punished once for her behavior in Athens, since the IOC decided to ban her from the 2008 Beijing games. With this recent action, the IOC is punishing her not just retroactively, but prospectively: her punishment is being handed down in 2009 for an infraction she committed in 2000, using her behavior in 2004 as evidence.
Ah, but the IOC, with its history of corruption, is all-powerful. Says spokesman Mark Adams, "The IOC feels we have a strong moral and a good legal case for that," spokesman Mark Adams said. "We are not legally bound to give medals. This is a case of taking no action. We have decided not to give her [Thanou] an honor that we don't think she deserves."
Adams's words are pretty interesting. Even though Thanou's alleged drug use at the Athens games four years later is not exactly news, at the time--the 2000 Olympics--she did in fact deserve the medal. Four years later, maybe not, but you can't punish her prospectively in 2000 for an event that occurred independently in 2004 (especially since she was punished in 2008 for the 2004 offense).
More here.
Recent Comments