Source :- THE AGE NEWS
Melbourne Cup-winning duo Anthony and Sam Freedman have escaped a spring carnival-crippling ban for treating horses with medication on a race day.
The father-and-son training partnership was disqualified for 28 days by the Victorian Racing Tribunal on Wednesday, allowing them enough time to regroup and prepare their runners for the lucrative Melbourne racing season. The Freedmans chose to start the ban on Thursday.
The Freedmans pleaded guilty to two charges of race day administration after stewards arrived at their Cranbourne stables on August 16 last year and discovered two horses, Kira and Moonhaven, had been hooked up to nebulisers.
The trainers were disqualified for 28 days for each of the charges, but allowed to serve those bans concurrently, and fined $1500 for the less serious offence of failing to keep treatment records.
Though the penalty fell well short of the mandatory six months, after the Victorian Racing Tribunal accepted the stable had met conditions for special circumstances by entering an early plea and cooperating in the investigation.
But it will still have a considerable financial impact on a family business that employs 60 staff across two states, forks out $4.56 million in annual wages and pays more than $40,000 a month in property leases for facilities at Cranbourne, Pinecliff and Randwick.
The “significant” impact a lengthy ban would have on the Freedmans and their staff was a factor in the tribunal not handing down a longer disqualification period.
“It would cause major disruption logistically and significant loss of income, not only to the respondents, but also to the employees,” tribunal chairman, magistrate Peter Reardon, said in handing down the findings.
“The respondents have outlaid large sums of money purchased in yearlings to syndicate them, and hopefully train them, with the legitimate expectation of a fine for such a breach, not a disqualification.
“The tribunal does not find these offences were as a result of systemic failure in the training operation, but there does appear to have been a degree of laxness creeping into their Cranbourne operation regarding their raceday procedures, and all trainers in future will have to ensure their staff are properly trained in stable raceday procedures regarding any potential breaches that have serious consequences.”
The tribunal warned the industry that trainers found guilty of such offences in the future would face heavier sanctions
“Trainers are now on notice of the consequences for breaching administration offences,” Reardon said.
The Freedmans released a statement at the time of being charged, saying: “An oversight occurred within the stable for which we take full responsibility. We take pride in our integrity and the strength of our systems, but any system in the world can fall victim to human error.”
A nebuliser is a legal breathing apparatus used to deliver therapeutic medication.
While they are not performance-enhancing, no medication is allowed to be administered to a runner on a race day under the rules of racing.
The horses were scratched from racing at Caulfield later that day.
Legal counsel Matthew Stirling, acting for the Freedmans, said it was a simple case of human error.
He said Anthony Freedman was in Sydney full-time, while son Sam was at the Cranbourne track gallops that morning.
Sterling said stable hand Debra Cooke had placed the nebulisers on both horses at different times of the morning after failing to notice yellow tags on their stable doors – a system designed to show which horses were running that day.
Sterling said another stable employee, Alex Maher, should have wiped the nebuliser treatment from the horses’ white boards to ensure they were medication-free on a race day.
“It was simply the same mistake made by the same person, Debra Cooke, that led to the nebulising of both Kira and Moonhaven,” Stirling said.
“It wasn’t an intentional or directed act of the trainers.”
But Stirling said the Freedmans, who won the 2023 Caulfield-Melbourne Cup double with Without A Fight, accepted they were accountable for the administration because they were the trainers.
The tribunal heard both horses were being treated with nebulisers, containing saline and antibiotic Accent, at the recommendation of stable vet Tom Brennan because they had throat and respiratory issues.
Kira had been on nebulisers for six weeks.
Sterling said there was further confusion about whether to treat the horses or not because Kira and Moonhaven had also been nominated to race at Sandown four days later.
Legal counsel Greg Buchhorn, acting for the stewards, said it was significant that the charges related to the treatment of two horses.
“It’s not a case of a one-off mistake,” Buchhorn told the tribunal.
“It is a case where there were two horses on race day, which both had the nebuliser used on them, and in my submission that underscores, in particular, why this sort of contravention is particularly serious.”
Buchhorn said it should have been obvious to Cooke and Maher, who had many years of experience under their belts, that “neither of these horses should have had the nebuliser given to them”.
“What was also concerning is that when both women were initially interviewed by stewards, they both said words to the effect that on race day, when these horses are racing, it was okay to give the horses the saline,” he said.
“Now, as a form of medication, it should have been clear to both of these people with the experience that they had, that that was just simply not right.”
Buchhorn said it was also concerning that Cooke and Maher understood that the Accent/saline solution was something that would not be detected by a swab.
“That was the reason why they said that these medications were not being recorded because they understood it would not be swabbed,” Buchhorn said.
The stewards had called for three-month bans on the two race-day administration charges and a $1500 fine for failing to keep treatment records.
