Dick Pound

"Principal Richard Pound" is the stage name of wrestler John Cozman.

Richard W. Pound, OC (born March 22, 1942) is a partner of leading Canadian law firm Stikeman Elliott and the chairman of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) based in Montreal. He is a former vice-president of the International Olympic Committee (IOC) and was a one-time candidate for the presidency of that organization.

Known as "Dick," he was born in St. Catharines, Ontario, Canada and was a swimming competitor at the 1960 Summer Olympics. He finished sixth in the 100 meter freestyle and was also on Canada's fourth place relay team. He would later win a number of medals at the 1962 Commonwealth Games. Retiring from swimming, he accepted a role with the Canadian Olympic Committee and eventually became its president.

In 1978 he was elected to the International Olympic Committee and was put in charge of negotiating television and sponsorship deals. Pound revolutionized the Olympic movement using such deals to transform the IOC into a multi-billion dollar enterprise. At the same time he became known as an outspoken critic of corruption within the IOC under the leadership of Juan Antonio Samaranch. His criticisms were given a wide airing after the scandals surrounding the Salt Lake City Olympics broke, and he was then appointed head of the inquiry into the corruption. He also campaigned vehemently for stronger drug testing.

In 1992 he was made an Officer of the Order of Canada and in 1993 was made an Officer of the National Order of Quebec.

Pound has also served as Chancellor of McGill University since July 1, 1999 and is a partner in the law firm of Stikeman Elliott LLP in Montreal. He practises tax law. He is also the author of several books on legal history. He edits Pound's Tax Case Notes, a review of tax-law court cases for lawyers. He did much of the reading of cases and the writing of the notes on international airplane flights to and from International Olympic Committee functions.

With the retirement of Samaranch in 2001 he ran for president of the IOC, but the voters chose the less tempermental Belgian Jacques Rogge. Pound finished third behind South Korean Kim Un-Yong, who was one of those found to have participated in the Salt Lake City scandals, and who was later prosecuted by the South Korean government.

Pound scaled back his involvement with the IOC and became head of WADA. In that role he has overseen an unprecedented toughening of the drug-testing regimen. Pound has been an especially harsh critic of the Americans, arguing that there is widespread doping, especially amongst their track and field team. He has also worked to expand WADA beyond the Olympics, calling on the major sports leagues to agree to WADA scrutiny. His allegations of widespread doping in professional bicycle racing have at times brought WADA into fierce public conflict with the Union Cycliste Internationale (UCI).

In more recent years, Pound has made several controversial statements and claims that have seriously hurt his credibility. He has made several charges without proof and has apparently abandoned all fairness in his great effort to ruin the credibility of Lance Armstrong.

NHL Controversy

In November 2005 Pound commented about the National Hockey League and said that, "You wouldn't be far wrong if you said a third of hockey players are gaining some pharmaceutical assistance."^[1] The basis for his allegations remain largely unknown and were made without any proof. Both the NHL and NHLPA have denied the claims, demanding Pound bring forth evidence rather than make such unsubstantiated claims. Since his comments were made, some NHL players have tested positive for banned substances, including Bryan Berard, Jose Theodore, whose failure was caused by the hair growth product Propecia, and two of 250 players involved in Olympic testing. As of June 13, 2006, zero players out of 1,406 tested came up positive for banned substances under NHL rules. Dick Pound remained skeptical, claiming the NHL rules were too lax and unclear, as they do not test for some banned substance, including certain stimulants.^[2]

2006 Winter Olympics Controversy

After Italian police raided the rooms of Austria's Nordic skiing team at the Torino winter games, Pound quickly told reporters that blood-doping gear had been confiscated. Again, his claims were largely unsubstantiated, and the team was cleared. One Austrian coach has sued Pound for defamation.

Attacks on Lance Armstrong

In recent years, Pound has taken a public stance against Lance Armstrong.

In 2004, scientists at a French lab were using frozen urine samples from the 2004 Tour de France in their studies to find a new way of detecting EPO, an oxygen-boosting agent. Some samples turned postitve, and Pound demanded the coded numbers for the cyclists that provided the positive samples. All this despite that the WADA (which Pound heads) having rules and guidlines protecting the identity of specimen-givers.

In the spring of 2005, information regarding the positive tests was leaked to L'Equipe, and the findings were published in August after the codes matched those of Lance Armstrong.

After this controversial attack, the UCI appointed Emile Vrijman, former head of the Netherlands' antidoping agency (and later defense lawyer of accused athletes of doping), to investigate the claims. In his report, made public May 31 2006, Vrijman cites extreme unprofessionalism by Pound as one of the main problems regarding the leak and subsequent attacks as L'Equipe was only able to get the codes after Pound's demands despite WADA rules and despite Pound's knowledge that there was not enough scientific evidence to attack Armstrong. Vrijman explains that in addition to WADA guidelines protecting the identity of sample givers being compromised, there was not enough urine to do the back-up test required by the UCI and WADA. Furthermore, there was no way to prove that the urine samples could not have been spiked with EPO and the WADA does not recognize retroactive testing to begin with. Vrijman concluded that Pound's suggestions that the urine samples proved Armstrong doped were "irresponsible."

In his own defense, Pound dismissed Vrijman's document as "so lacking in professionalism and objectivity that it borders on farcical." Later WADA released an official statement on the Vrijman reporthttp://www.wada-ama.org/rtecontent/document/wada_official_statement_vrijman_report.pdf,which notes among other things that, (1) WADA had nothing to do with l'Equipe's publication, (2) the UCI itself, with Armstrong's consent, gave the 15 doping control forms to l'Equipe, (3) WADA only asked the UCI to look into the matter at the time. The official statement asserts that WADA after exchange of letters, it seemed clear that UCI was not interested in conducting an enquiry, and only then, on 5 October, WADA initiated an enquiryâ€"which prompted UCI to mandate Vrijman the day after. About the report itself, it is noted that: "Mr. Vrijman [...] does not establish facts, as necessarily required by lawyers before reaching conclusion on the law," "As there are no proper factual conclusions, there can be no proper legal analysis," "when the facts are wrong the conclusions that are built on these facts are wrong. Mr. Vrijman's report is fallacious in many aspects and misleading"; subtantiated by a few examples.WADA also criticizes the process leading to the report, illustrating how, for WADA, it is a "breach of natural justice."

On June 9, 2006, Lance Armstrong sent a letter to Jacques Rogge, the president of the IOC, and requested that Pound step down as head of WADA. In his letter, he claimed that Pound was guilty of "reprehensible and indefensible" behaviour, with regards to his handling of repeated drug-use accusations aimed at the cyclist. Although the IOC is not an official party in the dispute, the organization hopes to help Pound and Armstrong reach a solution.