The Electronic Telegraph Monday 10 November 2003
British sportsmen and women who may have used THG to enhance their performance on home soil could escape punishment because of legal difficulties over the retrospective testing of stored urine samples. UK Sport, the government agency in charge of drug testing in Britain, have admitted that a test for the previously undetectable drug has created a legal minefield and that old samples collected across a range of sports may never be re-tested, as they were in the United States when re-tested samples from the national athletics championships in June revealed four THG 'positives'. At the heart of the legal debate is whether samples that have been previously given the all-clear can then be subjected to a second analysis, a process that would go against the principle of 'double jeopardy' that is enshrined in British law. "The issue with retrospective testing is whether we have got the right to test a negative sample a second time," said a UK Sport spokesman. "It is a grey area because it has never been an issue before. Our main concern is that we don't want to start testing for THG unless we are going to be able to follow any findings through." The legal debate is further complicated by the fact that UK Sport carry out drug tests across 41 sports, each of which has its own set of rules. They are consulting with administrators from all the affected sports to establish a common policy, though the fact that there is currently no provision for re-testing samples in any of the sports' regulations has only added to the headache. The argument over the legality of retrospective testing is not confined to Britain. Some international governing bodies have followed the lead of the United States and ordered the immediate re-testing of stored urine samples, most notably in athletics and swimming where samples collected at the sports' respective world championships in Paris and Barcelona have been sent for a second analysis. However, FIFA, the world governing body of football, have taken the opposite view and decided not to re-test samples on legal advice. Whatever the outcome of the legal debate in Britain over retrospective tests, it will have no bearing on the case of sprinter Dwain Chambers whose urine sample taken in an out-of-competition test in August was subjected to a single analysis. Eamonn Condon [EMAIL PROTECTED]
