Meadowlands Says It Won’t Scratch Adrienne Hall’s Horses

The Meadowlands released a statement late Thursday saying it will not scratch horses owned by Adrienne Hall, a harness owner and trainer who testified in federal court last week against Seth Fishman while admitting she used his performance-enhancing drugs on her horses.

Fishman was found guilty Wednesday of two counts of conspiring to violate adulteration and misbranding laws and the manufacture of PEDs administered to racehorses, and faces up to 20 years in prison.

The statement stands in contrast to the policy of the United States Trotting Association, which said Tuesday that her USTA membership had been revoked per Article 1, §4 of the Association bylaws. USTA membership is not required to be granted a Pari-Mutuel racing license in New Jersey, thus she remains eligible to race per the New Jersey Racing Commission.

“We disagree with the USTA decision and we applaud Ms. Hall for coming forward,” said Meadowlands president Jeff Gural. “To penalize those who testify for the prosecution will only serve to further the already existing notion that saying something will only lead to problems for yourself. It will discourage the type of participation necessary to convict the indicted persons, as Ms. Hall's testimony has helped on this case.

“The lack of action by the USTA during this five-year effort on our part to get rid of the cheats along with their continued opposition to the HISA [Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act] legislation which, with some changes, is our only hope of keeping the chemists out is dangerous to Harness Racing. We have received no support from USTA or any of their members in trying to eradicate the drugs and those who use them from racing.”

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Meadowlands’ Gural Defends Owner Who Admitted To Purchasing PEDs During Fishman Trial

Jeff Gural, owner of the Meadowlands Racetrack, has announced that he will allow owner Adrienne Hall to continue racing horses at his New Jersey oval despite her testimony during the federal doping trial which revealed that she purchased performance-enhancing drugs from Dr. Seth Fishman, reports NJ Online Gambling. Fishman was found guilty this week on two counts of conspiring to violate adulteration and misbranding laws and the manufacture of PEDs administered to racehorses by corrupt trainers.

Hall testified that she administered PEDs to her horses after purchasing them from Fishman. Her membership in the U.S. Trotting Association was revoked shortly thereafter, but a USTA membership is not required for her to race horses in New Jersey.

“We disagree with the USTA decision, and we applaud Ms. Hall for coming forward,” Gural said. “To penalize those who testify for the prosecution will only serve to further the already existing notion that 'saying something will only lead to problems for yourself.'

“It will discourage the type of participation necessary to convict the indicted persons, as Ms. Hall's testimony has helped on this case.

“The lack of action by the USTA during this five-year effort on our part to get rid of the cheats along with their continued opposition to the [Horseracing Integrity and Safety Act] legislation, which, with some changes, is our only hope of keeping the chemists out, is dangerous to harness racing.

“We have received no support from USTA or any of their members in trying to eradicate the drugs and those who use them from racing. The absence of coverage on ustrotting.com of the Fishman trial proceedings is inexcusable.

“We now have access to Seth Fishman's customer database files, which contain the names of hundreds of his clients, including several prominent trainers who hopefully can produce records showing what they purchased and why.”

Read more at NJ Online Gambling.

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Fishman Absent From Court After Wiretaps Reveal Him Bragging About Dubai Sales

Closing arguments were a late scratch Jan. 31 in the horse doping trial of veterinarian Dr. Seth Fishman being held in U.S. District Court in Manhattan.

New York U.S. District Court Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil met the lawyers for both sides in the robing room, then called the jury into the courtroom and sent them home. She told the jurors to return to court Tuesday.

“There has developed legal issues that need to be dealt with,” Vyskocil told the jury of eight women and four men.

But Fishman's absence in court only deepened the mystery. His wife, Hanna, was in the courtroom in the morning and at one point appeared to be visibly upset. Fishman is free on $100,000 bond and has appeared in court for each of the trial's previous eight sessions.

The only other clue as to what was happening came when Fishman attorney Maurice Sercarz appeared in the courtroom after the jury had been dismissed and told the judge Fishman was on his way to the hospital.

“We are in open court,” Vyskocil said to Sercarz in admonishment.

Sercarz and his co-counsel Marc Fernich and prosecutors declined further comment.

Lawyers showed up in the afternoon for another conference in the robing room. The day ended with Vyskocil never returning to the bench.

Closing arguments in Fishman's trial were set to begin after the prosecution rested its case and the defense rested without calling a single witness, including Fishman. The jury has heard five days of testimony from 11 government witnesses, as well as an FBI wiretap in which convicted trainer Jorge Navarro was recorded speaking to Fishman.

Another prominent name that emerged in court in one of the wiretaps was that of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai and the owner of the internationally successful Godolphin racing stable.

On the wiretap, Fishman appears to discuss a $2-million “program” with the Sheikh's hospital in Dubai, known as Dubai Equine. On the other end of the line in the 2019 call was Florida harness trainer Adrienne Hall, who testified Thursday that Fishman put her on a program with his PEDs and that she administered the drugs to a horse that won a low-level claiming race. Hall agreed to testify in exchange for a non-prosecution agreement.

A transcript of the wiretap obtained Monday begins with Fishman telling Hall that his program “is not instantaneous.”

“Right, so ok, because they are racing on Sunday–they are going to be in on Monday. I gave the other stuff today anyway,” Hall says.
Fishman then goes on to say that it takes one or two weeks to start things.

“This is a program,” he says. “This is a program that Dubai Equine spent probably $2 million devising for their Thoroughbreds, you know? It is part of a program that uh, you know…there's other stuff too.”

Fishman goes on to say that he was bringing Hall on slowly.

Fishman adds, “This is what they do for all their horses and overall, they are very happy. Sheikh Mohammed Maktoum said the best three years, you know, in the 30 years he has been racing and they are very happy. So, I'm sharing stuff with you. But then again that's for Thoroughbreds so we just have to tweak something out because some of the stuff I design for Standardbreds, they don't work.”

It was unclear if Fishman was simply trying to impress Hall; a Godolphin spokesman said they would have no comment Monday night.

Fishman, 50, is on trial on for conspiring to violate medication adulteration and misbranding laws. He's accused of supplying horse trainers with illegal performance-enhancing drugs designed to evade testing by racing regulators in various states, including Florida, New York, and Kentucky.

Sercarz says the actions his client has been accused of were carried out to protect the health and welfare of horses in keeping with his oath as a licensed veterinarian.

Prosecutors allege that Fishman was part of a sweeping conspiracy to dope racehorses that included top trainers Navarro and Jason Servis and two dozen others. The New York U.S. Attorney's Office announced the charges in March 2020.

Servis is awaiting trial and Navarro has been sentenced to five years in prison after pleading guilty. Servis's name hasn't come up in testimony, but Navarro's name has come up numerous times. Prosecutors said Navarro paid Fishman tens of thousands of dollars for PEDs.

The jury also saw a video of Navarro's doped X Y Jet (Kantharos) winning the $2.5-million G1 Dubai Golden Shaheen in 2019. In a text seen by the jury after the race, Navarro thanked Fishman for his help. A tally shows the FBI's aforementioned wiretap was one of 55 recordings the jury heard in the case. Almost all of them involved Fishman.

The Thoroughbred industry's leading publications are working together to cover this key trial.

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Two Active Trainers Testify At Fishman Trial, Say They Used His PEDs

Two current trainers testified Jan. 27 at Dr. Seth Fishman's horse doping trial that they raced horses on illegal performance-enhancing drugs that came from the accused veterinarian.

The testimony from Adrienne Hall and Jamen Davidovich highlighted the seventh day of Fishman's trial on adulteration and misbranding conspiracy charges. Fishman was one of 27 individuals charged in the case and is the first on trial. Those charged include two prominent trainers—Jason Servis, who is awaiting trial, and Jorge Navarro, who pleaded guilty and has been sentenced to five years in prison.

Hall, of Monroe, N.J., trains horses at the Sunshine Meadows harness track in Florida and last raced a standardbred last month in New Jersey. Davidovich, also an owner, raced primarily in the Mid-Atlantic in 2020-21. He has starts this year in New York and Ohio and says he approaches the sport now more as a hobby.

Both told the jury of eight women and four men how they went about getting in touch with Fishman in 2017 and 2018 with the sole intention of obtaining from PEDs that wouldn't show up in post-race testing.

“His reputation preceded him,” Davidovich, 31, of Pennsylvania said.

Hall testified Fishman gave her a PED called VO2 Max, which she used to dope a horse and win a harness race in March 2019. Prosecutors have elicited testimony that VO2 Max increases horses' oxygen levels that enable them to run faster and longer but at risk to their safety and well-being.

The jury heard a portion of an FBI wiretap that captured Hall excitedly telling Fishman about the first-place finish.

“I wish you could have seen the race,” Hall says to the veterinarian. “He was so fantastic. He dominated. He was a completely different animal. I was so happy.”

Hall added the horse's final quarter time was 27 seconds.

“What is it usually?” Fishman asks.

“Usually it's :28 or :29 and struggling,” she responds.

Hall testified that the PEDs were a gift from Fishman. She said she believed that was the case because Fishman wanted her to connect him to two trainers she knew.

One of those trainers was Todd Pletcher, the Hall of Famer who runs a large stable.

His name was revealed under cross-examination by Fishman attorney Maurice Sercarz.

Prosecutor Sarah Mortazavi, who initially questioned Hall, never asked Hall to reveal the names during her direct examination.

At the start of her direct testimony Hall had said that before she got her trainer's license, she worked at two Thoroughbred farms and for Pletcher's stable in an administrative position, not with horses.

Hall told Sercarz that even though she told Fishman she would contact Pletcher, she never did.

Mortazavi then asked why that was when she questioned the witness again.

“He would never take my advice or opinion,” Hall testified, referring to Pletcher. “I would never approach him about something like that.”

Hall was on the witness stand, testifying against Fishman as part of a non-prosecution agreement with prosecutors. They agreed not to prosecute her for doping horses.

Davidovich was testifying without any such agreement. Instead, he invoked his Fifth Amendment right not to testify and then was compelled to testify by Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil under a grant of immunity. Under a grant of immunity, a witness can't be charged with any crimes he or she admits to.

Hall and Davidovich could, however, potentially face sanctions from regulators after their testimony. Servis and Navarro have been suspended from racing, as have other indicted individuals.

Davidovich told the jury Fishman began supplying him with PEDs after a meeting at a sushi bar in Fort Lauderdale, Fla. He said there was a third person at the meeting, a person he described as “my owner.”

Asked by prosecutor Anden Chow how the subject of PEDs came up, Davidovich responded, “We were talking about different things to make the horse run better.”

Davidovich said that as they got to know each other, Fishman complained to him about Navarro. Prosecutors say Fishman was one of Navarro's suppliers of banned PEDS.

“He said Navarro owed him a lot of money, and he was going to cut him off if he didn't pay,” the witness testified. “He also said he didn't want (Navarro) taking down the whole ship because he had a loud mouth.”

Davidovich said Fishman was referring to a video shot at Monmouth Park in which Navarro and one of his owners bragged after winning a race that Navarro was the “Juice Man.”

Davidovich said he stopped doping horses in 2018 after meeting Dr. Steve Allday, a well-known Thoroughbred veterinarian.

“He was the first person in the business who took me under his wing and taught me a different way of being involved in horse racing,” he testified.

He added: “I know what I did was wrong, and I wanted to move forward in a different way.”

The Thoroughbred industry's leading publications are working together to cover this key trial.

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