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Florida Vet Garcia Wants Plea Change to Avoid Doping Trial

Erica Garcia, a Florida-based veterinarian, broke off her longstanding business relationship with the now-imprisoned trainer Jorge Navarro in early 2019. But she remained in contact with other conspirators of the Thoroughbred doping scheme that Navarro-and numerous other racetrackers-would later admit to.

So when federal investigators began compiling evidence that led to a nationwide series of arrests in a widespread racehorse drugging crackdown in March 2020, Garcia was considered fair game for her alleged role in the pipeline of purportedly performance-enhancing drugs.

Charged with two felony counts involving conspiracies to commit drug alteration and misbranding and defrauding the United States government, in Garcia tried in 2021 to get a federal judge to suppress the evidence obtained from searches of her car and phone. It didn't work.

Now Garcia, 43, wants to join many of the 30 other defendants in the case who have either already changed their pleas or been found guilty by trial. On July 29 she requested a hearing before the judge to do explain why she wants to flip from “not guilty,” and that request was swiftly accommodated with an Aug. 1 court date.

Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil will preside over the hearing. She's the same judge who wrote the order that denied the suppression of evidence.

“Garcia argues that the physical search of her car, pursuant to a search warrant, was invalid because the application for the warrant contained 'stale' evidence,” Vyskocil wrote last year. “The Court rejects this argument because the affidavit for the warrant presented evidence that Garcia was long involved in an ongoing conspiracy.”

“The affidavit in support of the warrant for Garcia's car detailed her long-term relationship with Navarro and ongoing involvement with members of his doping scheme. It described at least six instances over the span of four months in which Garcia discussed with Navarro administering prohibited substances to racehorses,” Vyskocil wrote.

“The affidavit acknowledged that Garcia's relationship with Navarro deteriorated in early 2019,” Vyskocil wrote. “It explained that, nevertheless, Garcia remained in touch with other members of Navarro's network, including his assistant trainer.

“In the light of the evidence of Garcia's longstanding and continuing involvement in a doping operation, there was probable cause to search her vehicle, notwithstanding her personal break with Navarro,” Vyskocil wrote.

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Fishman Appeals Conviction, 11-Year Sentence

Veterinarian Seth Fishman, who was sentenced to 11 years in prison July 11 after two felony drug-supplying convictions in a decades-long international racehorse doping conspiracy, has appealed his case to the United States Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit.

Fishman's notice of appeal landed on the electronic court docket shortly after 6 p.m. Eastern time Friday.

The filing noted that Fishman is appealing both the conviction and the sentence.

Fishman's 11-year sentence was the longest meted out in the case that led to charges against 31 individuals, including prominent trainers Jorge Navarro (who pleaded guilty last year and is currently serving a five-year sentence) and Jason Servis (who has pleaded not guilty and is set to stand trial in January).

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Feds: Fishman ‘Amplified the Disastrous Effects of Doping’

Six days before veterinarian Seth Fishman is to be sentenced for his two felony drug-supplying convictions in a decades-long international racehorse doping conspiracy, United States prosecutors told a judge he deserves a prison term greater than the 10 years recommended by federal probation officials, but below the maximum sentencing guideline of 20 years.

The feds also recommended that the judge not use convicted trainer Jorge Navarro's five-year sentence-the most severe among prison terms meted out so far in this conspiracy-as a measuring stick, because Fishman's criminal actions had a multiplying effect that caused exponential harm to racehorses, and he continued to peddle alleged performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) “until practically the eve” of his trial.

“[U]nlike the trainer-defendants charged and sentenced in this matter, Fishman's reach extended far beyond a single barn,” prosecutors stated in a July 5 sentencing submission filed in U.S. District Court (Southern District of New York).

“He supplied at least hundreds of trainers with his unsafe and illegal drugs. The breadth of the drugs the defendant offered for sale is unmatched by any other charged defendant in this action. The defendant was thus responsible for amplifying the disastrous effects of doping on racehorses in the industry. The defendant, under the guise of providing medically necessary veterinary care, enabled scores of corrupt trainers by selling unnecessary PEDs to enrich himself,” the filing stated.

Fishman undoubtedly tried to paint a different picture in his own sentencing submission that got filed June 27. But the public can't access that document, because his legal team asked for and received permission from the court to file it under seal.

Three days prior, on June 24, TDN reported that Fishman had to be hospitalized for psychiatric reasons during his trial earlier this year, thus explaining his cryptic absence during closing arguments. The presence of records related to his health could have been a reason the judge okayed shielding what is normally a public document.

The July 5 filing by the feds, however, shed some light on what Fishman wrote in his pre-sentencing filing, which is a convict's final chance to impress upon a judge that he doesn't deserve harsh punishment.

“It is unsurprising that the defendant's sentencing submission contains no expression of remorse or contrition,” the feds stated. “He likewise expresses no desire to reform. Even on the verge of sentencing, the defendant is entirely unrepentant for his crimes, and, absent a significant term of imprisonment, is at a high risk of recidivism.”

The government's report continued: “For almost two decades, including two years after his arrest in this matter, Seth Fishman cravenly pumped hundreds of thousands of illegal PEDs into the marketplace, and was dissuaded by no one–not state racing commissions, racetracks, the Food and Drug Administration, Customs and Border Protection, state drug regulators, the Federal Bureau of Investigation, the U.S. Attorney's Office for the Southern District of New York, nor this Court-to comply with the law.

“The defendant earned millions of dollars. He did so on the backs of racehorses that were doped by corrupt trainers. The defendant and his convicted co-conspirator, Lisa Giannelli, armed trainers motivated by greed with the means to corruptly win races by injecting and drenching racehorses with unsafe, medically unnecessary, prohibited PEDs.

“Fishman was not naïve or ignorant of the law. He did not 'exercise very poor judgment.' His crimes were not the product of a momentary lapse. Fishman was at the helm of a sophisticated, years-long, cross-border scheme to profit from the creation, marketing, sale, and distribution of illegal PEDs that he shipped across the country and around the world to unscrupulous trainers and others in the racehorse industry that sought to gain a competitive edge…” the filing stated.

“Over approximately 20 years, Fishman perpetuated the myth that he was operating as a legitimate veterinarian, conducting examinations, reaching diagnoses, and prescribing necessary medications for the treatment and prevention of bona fide medical issues.

“Yet Fishman did no such thing. He instead concocted novel PEDs, mass-produced his creations, and marketed and sold them to trainers across the country and around the world, resulting in millions of dollars of sales. He ran an illegal wholesale drug distribution business.

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Barred Trainer Tannuzzo Poised to Change Plea in Doping Case

The barred trainer Michael Tannuzzo appears poised to join the parade of indicted defendants in the 2020 racehorse doping conspiracy case who have changed their pleas to guilty in order to keep felony charges against them from getting decided at trial.

On Tuesday a federal judge granted Tannuzzo a swift July 7 hearing to explain his reasons for wanting to change his initial “not guilty” plea.

Tannuzzo, 50, who had 11 horses under his care and had been racing at Aqueduct at the time of his March 9, 2020, arrest, made headlines 24 hours later by steadfastly declaring his innocence and maintaining that the New York State Gaming Commission shouldn't have suspended his license after learning he had been booked by the feds on two felony charges related to conspiracies and drug misbranding.

Tannuzzo told Daily Racing Form at that time that he was being targeted by the feds because his “best friend” was the trainer and high-profile defendant Jorge Navarro. His two conspiracy charges were related to Tannuzzo picking up a package of purported performance-enhancing drugs from Navarro's residence and delivering it to him at Monmouth Park. Tannuzzo said that equated to “guilt by association.”

But since Tannuzzo made those initial statements in the press nearly 2 1/2 years ago, Navarro has admitted to doping his horses, changed his own plea to guilty, and is currently serving a five-year prison sentence. Tannuzzo's trial had been set to start Sept. 12.

According to a trove of wiretapped calls made public by federal prosecutors, on March 3, 2019, Navarro and Tannuzzo discussed modeling a doping program based on one Navarro had used on his elite-level stakes sprinter, X Y Jet.

A key takeaway from this discussion is that neither trainer seems sure of the name of the substance that would be administered.

Navarro: What I'm going to do is tap his ankles, put him in a series every week with SGF. I'm just trying [to get] my vet to give me a good price, man, because I want to [expletive] tap every week.

Tannuzzo: You're going to tap him every week?

Navarro: Yeah, with SGF. That's what I did with X Y Jet. I'm going to call my vet up north, my surgeon, to see how he did it to X Y Jet and that's it. Don't worry man, you're in good hands. Don't worry.

Tannuzzo: You're talking about the HGF, not the SGF.

Navarro: Yeah, yeah, yeah. Whatever. The SGF whatever. The thing that you sent me the syringe.

Tannuzzo: Yeah.

Navarro: Yeah, yeah. And [this undisclosed horse] is getting one of those SGF-1000 whatever. He's getting one today.

Within 10 months of that conversation, X Y Jet would die suddenly under Navarro's care, allegedly from cardiac distress that has never been fully documented or explained.

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