Attorneys for Bob Baffert and Zedan Racing Stables called the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission’s recent court filing “a complete waste of judicial resources,” in a Thursday response to the Franklin Circuit Court.
The KHRC filed documents Tuesday that accused the New York laboratory where Medina Spirit’s secondary urine sample from the Kentucky Derby was sent of depleting the primary urine specimen, which had been damaged during previous transit to the lab. The KHRC filing accused both the Baffert contingent and the lab of “a lack of candor and contemptuous conduct,” in the filed status report. Baffert and Zedan’s attorneys vehemently denied any wrongdoing in Thursday’s response.
“If the KHRC was at all interested in getting to the truth of this matter and following the science- wherever that may lead- its latest pleading would have never been filed,” the response read. “However, indeed of waiting for the parties’ agreed upon (and Court Ordered) testing lab… to complete its work and report on the results, the KHRC would prefer to make wild accusations that have not a scintilla of truth.”
The KHRC status report implied that Baffert and Zedan’s attorneys had been in contact with the lab regarding the primary sample, an allegation denied in Thursday’s filing. Baffert and Zedan’s filing also says the lab was unaware that it was not supposed to test the primary urine specimen.
The filing also says that the KHRC had previously tested the primary urine sample before it was sent to the New York lab.
The Friday filing also said the Baffert and Zedan contingent did not have the results of any testing that may have been performed on the primary urine sample, information that had been requested by the KHRC.
“The Court should disregard the KHRC’s thinly veiled gamesmanship and simply wait for the testing process to run its course,” the filing read. “The final report from the New York laboratory will assuredly address any and all testing that has been done and each of the parties can learn of those results at the same time as agreed and ordered by the Court.”
Counsel for the KHRC did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The court case began when Baffert and Zedan sued the KHRC to force the testing of the split urine sample after the primary was damaged in transit. The plaintiffs wanted the urine tested to try and prove Medina Spirit’s positive drug test after the Derby was a result of a skin cream containing betamethasone and not an injection of the drug.
“It is clear that the KHRC is strategically attempting to manufacture feigned outrage over a damaged sample it deems irrelevant to clear the path for its eventual refusal to accept any exculpatory results from the New York Laboratory on the sample that truly matters- the split urine sample,” the filing read.
