Doping scandal still growing
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This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from July 1998.
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TVM, a Dutch team, came under the spotlight earlier this week when it emerged that the substance EPO had been found in the car of one of its officials in March.
The International Union of Cycling (UCI), the sport's governing body, asked the Dutch cycling federation to carry out an inquiry and tour organizers threatened to expel TVM from the race.
Judicial sources said Thursday that police found evidence of used drugs in a suitcase and trashcan during a search of the team's hotel in Toulouse and Metz, though the nature of the drugs is still not known.
Meanwhile, nine riders from the Festina team thrown out of the Tour de France for using EPO arrived at a Lyon police station where they were formally placed under custody for questioning. They included Richard Virenque, Pascal Herve, Didier Rous, Alex Zulle, Armin Meier and Laurent Dufaux.
Earlier in the day, three other officials at the Festina team were detained for questioning the first time, according to judicial sources. They included the team's two joint sporting directors, Miguel Moreno and Michel Gros, and logistical director Joel Sabiron. France 2 television reported Moreno and Gros were formally detained for questioning.
Festina team director Bruno Roussel, doctor Eric Ryckaert and physiotherapist Willy Voet are already being detained by police investigating the scandal.
The already tarnished image of the Tour was damaged yet further Thursday when the French newspaper Le Parisien reported that the Belgian judge investigating the Festina case has proof that the team's riders took EPO. Belgian judge. Eric Van de Sijpe has coded medical records and computer files proving that the drug was supplied to team riders, Le Parisien said.
The code name "Willy" appeared in many of the computer files, but until the arrest of Voet on July 8, the judge was unable to trace the person's identity.
The president of the French Cycling Association, Daniel Baal, reacted to the growing scandals by saying that although they risk being very harmful to the image of the sport, "good will come out of bad."
"Once we know about these methods," he told French television station LCI, "we will know how to prevent it. We can start a real war against doping."
