Swiss Federal Court 4A_222_2015 Johan Bruyneel vs USADA & WADA
Related cases:
- AAA No. 77 190 00225 12 USADA vs Johan Bruyneel, Pedro Celaya Lezama & José Martí Martí
April 21, 2014
- CAS 2013_A_3285 Johan Bruyneel vs USADA
May 13, 2014
- CAS 2014_A_3598 Johan Bruyneel & Jose Martí vs USADA | WADA vs Johan Bruyneel, Pedro Celaya Lezama, Jose Martí Martí & USADA - Partial Award
October 24, 2018
Mr. Bruyneel served as a team director for the U.S. Postal Service team between 1999 and 2004 and the Discovery Channel team between 2005 and 2007.
In June 2012, the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) informed Johan Bruyneel, Mr. Lance Armstrong and others that a formal action was opened based on evidence that each party had engaged in anti-doping violations under the UCI Rules from 1998 to 2012, the World Anti-Doping Code (WADC) from inception to 2012 and the USADA Protocol for Olympic and Paralympic Movement Testing from inception to 2012.
Johan Bruyneel, Pedro Celay Lezama (the team physician), José Martí Martí (the team trainer) were charged of possession, trafficking, administration and to have assisted, encouraged, and facilitated the use of prohibited doping agents to the professional cyclists on these U.S.-based teams. The banned doping agents and methods alleged to have been administered in this case: erythropoietin, hGH, blood transfusions, cortisone, testosterone and/or saline, plasma or glycerol infusions.
On 21 April 2014 the Panel of the American Court of Arbitration (AAA) in its final Award decided to impose a 10 year period of ineligibility on Johan Bruyneel starting from 12 June 2012 and continuing through and including 11 June 2022.
In May 2014 Johan Bruyneel, Pedro Celay Lezama, José Martí Martí and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) appealed the AAA Award of 21 April 2014 with the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS).
Bruyneel and the others asserted with arguments that USADA and the AAA Court had no jurisdiction and they requested the CAS Panel to annul the AAA Award of 21 April 2014.
The Swiss Federal Court notes:
"When the AAA Tribunal issued a final award on April 21, 2014, and banned him for ten years, he appealed to the CAS. The CAS agreed to bifurcate the proceedings and decide on jurisdiction first. The Panel issued a preliminary decision on March 2, 2015, accepting jurisdiction but not in the form of an award. The CAS counsel in charge simply advised the parties that, provisionally, the USADA and the AAA Tribunal had management jurisdiction and disciplinary authority, respectively. The reasons would be included in the final award."
"Counsel acting for the manager was therefore faced with yet another instance of the embarrassing and sometimes very difficult consequences of the case law of the Federal Tribunal concerning “implicit” decisions on jurisdiction, which are not contained in a formal award but may be an “award” materially speaking, even though they appear in the format of an innocuous procedural order."
"The decision is a very difficult one because if a procedural order contains an “implicit” jurisdictional decision and one does not appeal it within 30 days, it can no longer be appealed with the final award. Reasonable counsel will therefore not run that risk."
"The Federal Tribunal analyzed the various exchanges and reached the conclusion that the decision was not, in fact, an “implicit award on jurisdiction” but this does not do away with the difficulties created by Swiss case law in this respect."
"Prudent counsel will therefore continue to appeal decisions that may or may not be “implicit” awards on jurisdiction with the corresponding costs for the parties."
The Swiss Federal court decides on 28 January 2016 to dismiss the appeal because.
