The prosecution in the federal doping conspiracy case against former trainer Jorge Navarro filed its sentencing report to judge Mary Kay Vyskocil on Friday. The report asks for Navarro to receive the maximum five years in federal prison.
“Jorge Navarro’s case reflects failings, greed, and corruption at virtually every level of the world of professional horse racing,” the introduction of the report said. “For money and fame, corrupt trainers went to increasing extremes to dope horses under their care.”
The report included damning details of Navarro’s operation, and notes how blasé the former trainer was about his doping operation. An included photo depicts a pair of clogs the trainer allegedly kept at his barn, emblazoned with the title “juice man.”
In a text message included in the document, Navarro had used an animated GIF of a syringe’s plunger pulling back and being filled with money.
“It is not the case that Navarro’s crime was the result of a single lapse in judgment, confined in time and scope,” the report said. “To the contrary, Navarro engaged in repeated and persistent efforts to cheat over the course of years, cycling through various sources of supply, and pursuing aggressively new means to illegally dope horses. Yet Navarro never acknowledged the seriousness of his crimes.”
Detailed in the report is Navarro’s flippant attitude toward the death of horses in his care. The filing points out that letters written to the court by Navarro’s family and friends that claim the trainer cared deeply about his horses “ring false.”
Mentioned by name is X Y Jet, who died of what Navarro called a heart attack in January of 2020, mere months before Navarro and others, including Jason Servis, were arrested for the conspiracy in March of that year.
“Navarro’s communications in the first quarter of 2019 indicated that, even one year prior, “XY Jet”—who had undergone three knee surgeries—was struggling, but was then-medicated so that he could race competitively,” the letter said.
Navarro is alleged to have known that the horse was tied-up, which meant he was suffering from something akin to severe cramps, before a race and had given it a regimen of illegal substances to keep the gelding running. Marcos Zulueta, another party in the case, told Navarro he should not run the horse in a race in his current state.
Navarro then responded to Zulueta, saying he had began treating him right away and detailed his plan to give the horse a serum known as “baking soda” and a “blocker” medication.
“When he peed . . . he didn’t pee too much blood or anything ugly,” Navarro said of X Y Jet according to the filing.
The extent of Navarro’s program is laid out in the report, noting that he and others used drugs including “pain relievers, red acid, “bleeder” pills, ventipulmin, SGF-1000, and various blood builders.”
The trainer is alleged to have taken various steps to avoid being caught, including giving horses drugs orally as opposed to injecting, so as to not leave needle marks. Navarro also tried to avoid using his own name when purchasing drugs for horses.
A conversation between Navarro and another party about the trainer’s treatment of Nanoosh, a horse he also owned. is laid out in the document. The other party, described as a horse owner, asked Navarro if the horse in question was getting “all the sh*t,” including “pills.”
“Everything...he gets everything,” Navarro responded, according to the document, before the other party told him he did not have to admit that over the phone.
The filing also claims Navarro had communicated with another party about a pain medicine he had been offered, saying the person attempting to sell him the drug had told him that it had killed four horses. He also expressed his desire to learn how to “tube” horses.
Zulueta, the former trainer who was talking to Navarro about the practice and who also pled guilty earlier this year, told Navarro he had once nearly killed a horse by tubing its lungs, which caused it to vomit.
“Yes,” Navarro responded, according to the prosecution.
Navarro’s team filed its own pre-sentencing report last Friday, acknowledging that the former trainer is likely to be deported to Panama and serve up to five years in the case. Navarro pleaded guilty to a count of conspiracy to commit drug adulteration and misbranding.
“I administered drugs that were misbranded and/or adulterated, as they were new drugs without FDA approval,” Navarro said at the hearing where he changed his plea to guilty. “They were administered to horses without a valid prescription and/or were manufactured in facilities without FDA registration.”
Navarro is scheduled to be sentenced on Dec. 17.
