Ten warned off after Sabre Light inquiry

Jeff Pearce

More than two years after the race, 10 people – including trainer Jeff Pearce, former Classic-winning trainer Geoff Huffer and jockey Jerry O’Dwyer - have been warned off after a BHA investigation.

Pearce and Huffer were found guilty by the disciplinary panel of conspiracy to ensure Sabre Light did not run on his merits at Lingfield Park on December 17th 2008 and disqualified for three and four years respectively. O’Dwyer, who rode Sabre Light, was found guilty of deliberately failing to ride the horse on his merits and was disqualified for 18 months.

Along with them seven other people - Gary Banham, Sharon Williams, Peter Root, Mark Benton, Patrick Wrixon, Jeffrey Conrad and Steven Radford – none of whom are licensed individuals, all received indefinite exclusions from the BHA. They cannot apply for the exclusion orders to be lifted by the authorities for at least two years and Banham will serve an additional suspension after the panel found that he had made threats of violence to two BHA investigators, John Burgess and Stuart Williams, when they attempted to interview him.

The verdicts bring to an end a long-running inquiry which was set in motion on the day that Sabre Light ran in the Holly and the Ivy Claiming Stakes, finishing fifth of 13 runners, beaten a total of five-and-three quarter lengths. What is described as a “red alert”was given to the stewards at Lingfield due to the suspicious betting patterns. They convened an inquiry into the horse's running, but did not find any breach of the Rules of racing.

Recordings of the race were then reviewed in the next few days by Michael Whyatt, then the Disciplinary Race Analyst with the BHA. He said he was “comfortable” with the view of the race that the Lingfield Stewards had taken.

However, that was not the end of the story and not long afterwards the BHA’s integrity and licensing department began an in-depth investigation into the betting and of those involved with Sabre Light. That included analysis of betting patterns on exchange markets which showed that a number of account holders had placed five-figure lay bets against Sabre Light, risking sums which were much larger than the stakes they usually placed. That investigation took a full 18 months and resulted in the charges that were laid at this inquiry.

Pearce was found guilty of failing to ensure O’Dwyer rode the horse on its merits, for concealing the true owner of the horse - which was Huffer and not former Newmarket publican Fran O'Brien, in whose colours the gelding ran when both winning and then finishing fifth - and communicating inside information about the horses in his yard to Huffer.

Huffer, who won the 2000 Guineas with Cockney Rebel in 2007 before retiring for a second time, was found guilty of concealing his identity as the horse’s owner, laying the horse or arranging for others to do it, and for getting Pearce to supply him with inside information about horses in the yard.

Sabre Light started at 7-2 second favourite, after opening on course at 11-4, and lay bets identified as belonging to those charged netted approximately £40,000. However, while the panel concluded that Huffer, Pearce, and O'Dwyer had conspired to ensure that Sabre Light did not run to his merits in the Lingfield race, and that a number of individuals had placed bets which were based on knowledge that Sabre Light would not be allowed to do so, they could not conclude that there was sufficient evidence that the source of that information was Sabre Light’s connections.

However, it was not an entire victory for the BHA investigators as the panel criticised the methods employed when questioning those involved. Pearce said during the inquiry that he was subjected to what he described as “Gestapo tactics”, and the panel concurred with Pearce that investigators the BHA investigators, primarily David Murphy and John, “had decided from the outset that Pearce and Huffer were guilty.”

Yet a further criticism of the investigation was that false points were sometimes put to interviewees, especially Pearce. He was told at one stage that Huffer was a “friend and associate” of one of the lay betters, Gary Banham. Unsurprisingly, that caused Pearce to doubt his friend Huffer and lead him to say that Huffer had “hung me out to dry”.

There was in fact no evidence that Huffer and Banham knew each other, and David Murphy, who had put the point to Pearce, was unable to recall his basis for saying it. Again, the Panel recognised that it would be necessary for investigators to put many theories and suggestions to interviewees. But if ultimately there is no factual basis for them, answers which assume their truth will not have any value. That was the approach taken here by the Panel.

However, despite deficiencies in the investigation, that did not deflect the panel that the evidence presented merited the bans that were handed out.

Paul Wheeler

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