The Case For Prosecution Of Dopers

By Author: Henry Ford
Total Articles: 189
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For a long time, the issue of prosecution of dopers remains controversial. For a long time, doping has attracted only a lenient punishment for being banned from sports for few years but there is a not legal prosecution. Since the turn of the 20th century when the sporting industry became highly commercialized, doping was taken as an issues meriting immediate attention as the number of people relying on sports their livelihood increased and the call for fair competition was encouraged. Ethically, any competition is considered fair when all competitors are provided with a fair playing ground where they can compete depending on their abilities rather than synthetic body enhancements through drugs. Lack of legal prosecution has reduced the issue of doping to a child play since if individuals can dope and win the game and then be banned for few years, it would not be a great deal for their sporting career since they would eventually make a come back. The main concerns for most people is that although doping is considered to have serious impact on the credibility of sports personality and the whole fraternity, it has not been clearly ...
... criminalized to enable enforcement of legal punishment to dopers. This paper aims at establishing a major justification for the legal framework to regulate operation of doping. The main aim of the paper is to prove that application of criminal law on doping infractions would be a better idea to deter potential dopers and ensure that there is honesty in sports. Such punishment, when applied in sporting is likely to produce similar effect it has produced on the criminal justice system and would deter other from doping. Creation of a strong legal foundation would ensure that there is consistence and efficiency in enforcement of anti-doping regulations and dopers receive legal punishment which is equal to the crime they have committed.
Criminalization of doping
Doping is a major problem affecting the society. Despite the tightened anti-doping regulations the number of dopers has continued to increase, raising serious questions on the effectiveness of the current regulations to stop doping (Gregory 2). Doping, as a major challenge in sports, can be assessed in different dimensions ranging from social to political dimensions (oulihan 28). However, most of analysis of the problem of doping has been on the social aspect of the problem alone not much attention has been on the political dimension, including the potential of using this dimension to deal with the problem. Doping is left to be tackled by the sports sociologist but the political and legal dimension in sports completely ignores the magnitude of the problem.
Objection to the use of drugs in sports is based on the issue of fairness in competition and health of the individual. These two issues have been used by sports governing bodies to be major justification of the reason why individuals should not be allowed to dope (Gregory 2). The issue of fairness in sports emanates from the sports ethics with strong believe that sports should be competition on the individual ability but not on strengths which has been acquired through doping (O’Leary 40). This implies that from an ethical perspective doping will be considered as an unethical act that should not be tolerated in sports. However, despite having clear understanding of the intersection between ethics and competition, the number of dopers has continued to increase, which shows that not many people pay attention or believe in fair competition, so long as they can lay claim the ultimate monetary price and fame that comes with being a sports celebrity. On the other hand, health issue is used to warn potential dopers of the health consequences they are likely to suffer due to doping. Like other drugs, doping drugs come with health consequences. As far as 1886, the health effects of doping came to reality when Arthur Linton died during Bordeaux-Paris race after doping. In 1904, Thomas Hicks, who was a marathon runner also collapse and died after he won Saint-Louis Olympic, after he doped Styrchnine(Gregory 3). IN 1960, a renowned cyclist, Jensen K. also died in course of a 100 km race in Rome Olympics and he was diagnosed to have doped Ronicol. In 1975, Kangasniesmi, who was a weight lifter, died due to anabolics (Gregory 3). There is not shortage of example of people sportsmen and women who have lost their lives after doping. This is also clearly evident to potential dopers but it appears like each of them want to try their luck. For most athletes, there is no single drug that can satisfy their demand to improve performance and therefore most of them results to taking a cocktail of drugs. This is meant to ensure that they not only acquire the power but they also stimulate the power, and sustain it for a longer time in the course of competition. The cocktail of drugs comes with different drugs that have different combined effects. For example, amphetamines are combined with corticoids, cardio-respiratory analeptics or cocaine, and caffeine or ephedrine; EPO is combined with aspirin or any other anticoagulant, or with natural glucorticodis, and others. These are just example of cocktails that athletes take (Gregory 3). The impact of these drugs on their health is not debatable as they have been known to cause multiple health effects.
The issue of ethics and health forms the bases for the development and application of criminal law on doping infractions. They call for development of a legal framework that would ensure that they are not just mentioned but they are also enforced (O’Leary 51). However, development of legal framework to be applied in doping raises a number of philosophical and jurisprudential arguments.
There have been many arguments in support of criminalization of doping. For example Jason Lowther argues that criminal controls, other than those that would be expected for consumer protection will neither help the sports image or health of non competitive user (Gregory 3). However, this argument can be refuted on the grounds that it lacks subjectivity and factual certainty. It is general acceptable that image of sports will be protected through enactment of very tough measures which will ensure that the culture of cheating, which has been contributed by increasing commercialization of sports, will be completely eliminated.
For health aspect, there are arguments that have been advanced in favor of introduction of criminal framework to govern doping. In 1985, a symposium was held in London University’s King’s College by the Sports Council (Gregory 4). This meeting presented important facts that emphasized the implementation of a campaign in support of drug testing and institution of tough measures that will eliminate the culture of doping. The symposium presented formidable oral, documentary, and visual evidence, which clearly showed the adverse effects of doping on health. This symposium highlighted the fundamental relationship between doping and ethical problems in sporting. Although this symposium highlighted important factors that were to be considered by the governing bodies in stopping doing, including institution of a legal framework, little has been achieved. Governing bodies have done little to come up with solutions that are likely to resolve the issues in a constructive manner. Most people however acknowledge that lack of Corinthian sporting ideals, which emphasize on ethical and moral aspects of competition have contributed to the growth of cheating culture in sports and it will be difficult to come up with strategies to sneak in Corinthian sporting ideal, leaving legal framework the best option to instill ethics and moral considerations in sports (Parry 155).

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