Essendon AFL Drug Saga

Website Summary

  1. This website includes a selection from the two million words that I wrote about the Essendon-AFL-ASADA Drug Saga and the submissions I made to the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO) enquiry into whether Sport Integrity Australia (SIA) had established fit-for-purpose governance arrangements.
  2. Fortuitously, for those with limited time, you only need to know the following information to learn that the unjust guilty verdict against 34 Essendon AFL players was based on many breaches of Section 317 of the Crimes Act (which carried a ten-year gaol sentence), unprecedented corruption by the AFL, the Australian Sports Anti-Doping Authority (ASADA) and the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA), coupled with compliant apathetic, inept Labor and Coalition Governments.
  3. Thirty-four Essendon AFL players were charged by ASADA with being administered an alleged WADA prohibited substance Thymosin Beta-4.
  4. Essendon sports science consultant Stephen Dank was charged by ASADA with administering Thymosin Beta-4 to the 34 players.
  5. After an 18-day hearing, the AFL Tribunal, which included two judges and a barrister, found the 34 players NOT GUILTY.
  6. Stephen Dank was found NOT GUILTY of administering or attempting to administer Thymosin Beta-4 to the players and NOT GUILTY of assisting, encouraging, aiding, abetting or covering up administration of Thymosin Beta-4.
  7. ASADA chose not to appeal the decision against the players and Dank.
  8. Incomprehensibly, WADA, urged on by a senior Australian sports official named redacted, and assisted by Coalition Sports Minister Sussan Ley, appealed the NOT GUILTY decision to the players but ACCEPTED the NOT GUILTY decision against Dank.
  9. The Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) subsequently found the 34 players GUILTY of being administered Thymosin Beta-4, despite the only compounding substance manufacturer supplying extensive (stock, supply, invoices, payment and courier) records that he never supplied Dank or Essendon with Thymosin Beta-4 and despite ASADA admitting in an affidavit that there was no evidence that either Dank or Essendon ever took possession of Thymosin Beta-4.
  10. Having no evidence that neither Dank nor Essendon took possession of Thymosin Beta-4 notwithstanding, the criminal corruption started on Monday 4 February 2013, nine days before the first witness was interviewed. It is irrefutable that Thymosin Beta-4 was not listed by name by WADA or by any of its 208 affiliated anti-doping agencies as a prohibited substance before 10:34:17 AM on 4 February 2013. At 12:59:17 PM, Thymosin Beta-4’s status on the ‘Check Your Substances’ was listed as a prohibited substance by name. Someone at ASADA had unlawfully changed Thymosin Beta-4 status on its ‘Check Your Substances’ website.
  11. As it transpires, WADA changed Thymosin Beta-4 status on 1 January 2018, which begs the question, why were the players charged in 2013 for using a substance that wasn’t banned by name until 2018?

Introducing Bruce Francis

10 November 2016: 9.51pm 

Dear Mr Little

I have been virtually homebound for 14 years. I haven’t been on an aeroplane in the 21st century. My doctor visits me at home every fortnight and doesn’t want me to fly. Despite this, I agreed to share the stage in Melbourne with James Hird on 1 December. I was supposed to talk for two hours and all James was required to do was answer questions from the audience.

I spoke to James on Tuesday and he is a broken man. He is so fragile I thought the anxiety he was obviously experiencing might push him over the edge. I told him he was in no fit state to talk in public and I called off the function.

James not only cannot get a job but outside influential people have stopped him getting jobs.

I have no idea whether James would even talk to you but I do know he needs someone to reach out to him and possibly use their contacts to get him a job. Can you help him please?

I have never had a vested interest in this saga. I am a rugby follower first and a fanatical Swans supporter second and couldn’t recall ever meeting an Essendon supporter. As it transpires, Greg Chappell is an Essendon tragic.

In June 2013, Mark Thompson was told by a mutual acquaintance that I had the best forensic skills in the country. He phoned me out of the blue and asked me if I would assess the situation for him. I was appalled at what I discovered and have spent 12 to 15 hours a day, seven days a week since July 2013 on the matter. I have clocked up over 10,000 hours. I have 71 arch lever folders with over 20,000 pages in them and have written over 800,000 words. I have had probably 150 phone conversations with Stephen Dank and have probably spent 60 to 70 hours on the phone with him. I know more than the Essendon lawyers, ASADA lawyers and WADA lawyers put together.

I have no idea whether the players were administered Thymosin Beta-4. I do know that there is no evidence that they were administered Thymosin Beta-4.

My team believes the attached document provides irrefutable proof that the CAS panel was inept, biased and arguably corrupt. If your lawyers can find any holes in the document then they are better than mine.

I don’t know any of the players. I have never met James Hird. I have now spoken to him about half a dozen times. Mark Thompson coached the team in 2014 because I told him to. I shall send you the email that persuaded him to take the coaching job. I have never taken a penny for my work. That’s no big deal. My point is I don’t understand how people who have loved these players, and particularly have loved James, can sit back and do nothing. I have had a small stroke since being involved in the matter. Although I don’t know any of them, I just can’t walk away from it. If you’re aware of an injustice or aware that someone, anyone, is tottering on the brink, I think you have a moral obligation to help.

Please see if you can help James. As I said earlier, I have no idea what James thinks of you and I have no idea whether he would want to talk to you. He has never expressed a view about anyone except Caroline Wilson. I lie. I sent him a copy of the chapter from my book on Andrew Demetriou. James to my astonishment said he felt sorry for Andrew.

I do know James would probably kill me if he knew I had written to you. I shan’t tell him that I’ve written.

Yours sincerely

Bruce Francis