By GEOFF CUMMING and PHIL TAYLOR
On a stunning autumn day in May, police cars fanned out into the manicured countryside west of Christchurch, cruising the flat, straight roads past magnificent homes, racing stables and the inevitable vineyard. At 11am, glamour trainer Mark Purdon was startled to see police cars roll up the sealed drive of his state-of-the-art training establishment in Russley Rd, Yaldhurst.
Just a week before, he and wife Vicki had played host to Racing Minister Damien O'Connor, keen to learn from a harness racing luminary about issues affecting a resurgent industry.
Christchurch, with its Addington raceway, is its internationally regarded heartland and none of the training establishments that dot the city's western fringes are more impressive than Purdon's, built for him by the industry's leading owner, multimillionaire John Seaton.
But on this day, May 6, police were more interested in racing's seedy side - betting and illicit drugs.
It was an unseasonably warm day, but Purdon was not the only high-profile trainer feeling the heat. At Weedons, southwest of the city, premiership rival Nigel McGrath was also searched by the police.
Racing officials, meanwhile, were visiting three other properties owned by industry giants: David and Catherine Butt, who would go on to win this year's premiership; David's cousin Tim; and thoroughbred (gallops) trainer Paul Harris.
The Butts are known beyond the industry for the exploits of Lyell Creek, the star trotter owned by prodigious gambler Graham Bruton, also known as Steelballs. Tim Butt was disgusted. "I've nothing to hide," he told the Christchurch Press. "I'm quite happy for anyone to have a look around my place, but I object to being treated like a common criminal.
"I was talking to a new owner at 11am when they [officials] arrived. Imagine what the owner was thinking."
Purdon was more relaxed, accepting that the visit was part of a widespread investigation. "It may be the best thing to find a level playing field. I was quite comfortable about it."
The police were investigating fraud allegations involving betting and doping. Independently, harness racing officials had come by a sample of a new wonder drug known as Blue Magic, a concoction based on propantheline bromide, a banned substance in racing thought to boost cardiovascular performance. It was touted as undetectable.
When they became aware of the police inquiry, they joined forces. Samples of substances found on the properties were taken away for testing and the racing rumour mill went into overdrive.
What wasn't widely known was the raids weren't the first with a Kiwi connection. The previous week, on April 28, Victorian police investigating drug trafficking had raided the Ballarat stables of trainer Rod Weightman.
Weightman had a newly acquired reputation as a trainer who could take on crocks and turn up trumps with them. He'd come from nowhere to be in Victoria's top 10 trainers, winning 30 races from 69 starts.
Police found several items of interest on the property, including 6kg of cannabis and stolen goods including a motorcycle and ride-on lawnmower. He would be fined A$4000 ($4410) on the stolen goods charges.
But what interested racing officials were 62 unlabelled tubes in his fridge. Tests showed them to be Blue Magic. Checks of swabs available of Weightman's horses turned up seven positives. He protested there was nothing illegal in Blue Magic, but was eventually banned from involvement in racing for five years.
Victorian officials believed Weightman's supplier was Robert Asquith, a Canterbury horseman who lived for several years in Ballarat before returning to Oxford, north of Christchurch, late last year. Asquith was suspected by New Zealand harness racing officials of being the source of the sample that had fallen into their hands.
The Victorian raid may have prodded New Zealand authorities into action, but the May 6 searches had the effect of pouring kerosene on smouldering twigs. Industry whispers of an isolated doping incident fanned rapidly into something much more sinister.
Harness Racing NZ general manager Edward Rennell recalls: "We knew with the profile of the people we approached it would generate quite a bit of media interest, but we have taken the approach of being open and transparent."
Rennell says reputations had to bow to the seriousness of the allegations: "The police information led them to taking out search warrants ... "
The Butts and Harris were quickly cleared, but inquiries into McGrath and Purdon would snowball into the industry's worst nightmare, and then into a bigger tragedy.
On July 20, Asquith was found dead at his Oxford home north of Christchurch. This week, in the early hours of Monday morning, Seaton, a close friend of Purdon's and regarded as the industry's Donald Trump, was found dead by his wife, Anne, in their Yaldhurst mansion. In both cases, police found no suspicious circumstances and referred the deaths to the coroner.
Asquith, at the time of his death, faced one charge brought by police under the Medicines Act of supplying a prescription medicine, punishable by a $1000 fine.
He was, however, expecting to be interviewed by Australian authorities, who had since charged three other trainers, as well as Weightman, with using Blue Magic. They suspected Asquith of supplying all four.
Seaton, at least a nodding acquaintance of Asquith and who had introduced Asquith to Purdon, learned last week he would be charged in relation to the alleged doping of one of his Purdon-trained horses, Light and Sound, at meetings in March and April.
The charges came in spite of Light and Sound testing negative for Blue Magic on both occasions. Those against Seaton, and two further counts against Purdon, were laid by harness racing officials during Cup week, the biggest date in Canterbury racing - where no name was bigger than Seaton's.
The former truck driver had amassed a $37 million fortune from his gambler's knack of seizing on opportunities to buy and sell property, sheep and cattle. With his eye for stock, love of a good auction and personal fortune, harness racing became more than a diversion to Seaton. He was one of the most prominent yearling buyers at national auctions, sometimes spending half a million dollars to restock his stable.
He teamed up with Purdon in 1991 and a production line of superstars followed, starting with Il Vicolo, winner of two New Zealand Cups, three Derbys and $1.58 million in stakes.
Most Purdon horses were at least part-owned by Seaton, who lured him from Ardmore to the Yaldhurst complex with its superb training track and equine pool in 2001.
Seaton wasn't in it for the money - even the highest stakes in harness racing would not tempt a property tycoon - but he loved the sport. He gave money to clubs and almost single-handedly revived harness racing, which - like the gallops - suffered badly in the 1990s from declining on-course attendances and casino gambling.
While stakes have improved markedly in recent years, harness racing retains a close-knit, almost family image. If found guilty of the charges laid last week, Seaton would certainly have been shut out of the sport and shunned by Christchurch society. He angrily confronted officials at Addington on Friday and later vowed to defend himself and Purdon.
His death prompted Seaton's many supporters to round on officials over the timing of the charges, suggesting they were designed to humiliate. Rennell was left with the unenviable job of defending his organisation - pointing out that it was Seaton's outburst that brought the accusations into the open.
"We don't proceed lightly," he told National Radio. It was important to protect the integrity of the industry.
Just how jealously the industry guards its integrity is clear from the Judicial Control Authority's handling of the hearing against Nigel McGrath, the other New Zealand trainer charged, and the only one dealt with so far by authorities.
McGrath, his stable foreman Phil Burrows and employee James Keast, were charged on June 2 after McGrath horses Me N Jim and Whodunnit tested positive to Blue Magic - Me N Jim after running second at Alexander Park on April 23 and Whodunnit after winning runs at Addington on April 23 and Forbury Park, Dunedin, on April 29. The latter was a "claiming race" - for horses available for sale.
McGrath, 30, had been in harness racing since he was 15, building up a 18ha property with 40 horses at Weedons, southwest of Christchurch. He had a clean record and was in the top five in the premiership when he appeared before the Judicial Control Authority in August.
He told the inquiry he first heard about Blue Magic "talking to a person in a bar" while working in California six years ago, before he began training on his own in New Zealand. He believed propantheline was useful in treating stomach ulcers, and mixed it into the night feed to improve appetite and general wellbeing. It was his own little secret, as "all trainers want to get the edge on others".
He said he obtained propantheline in tablet form from his GP, saying it relieved his own stomach ulcer. This way, it was cheaper than getting it from a vet. Although he did not believe it was illegal, he was careful not to feed it within seven days of racing.
Like Weightman in Victoria, he submitted that disqualification would be "out of all proportion to the culpability and offending disclosed". He had not travelled to the Auckland or Dunedin meets and maintained, along with Burrows and Keast, that the pre-race feeding was a mix-up.
But the trio were to fall foul of newly tightened rules making those in charge liable for any drug in the horse's system, whether or not they are proven to have administered it.
The judicial committee found that the drug must have been administered within 24 hours of each race for it to be detected. "For that to have occurred not once, but three times, in different parts of the country cannot be regarded as accidental. The responsibility clearly falls on the trainer."
It banned McGrath for three years and fined him $2400. Burrows was disqualified for six months and fined $800. Keast was found technically in breach of the new strict liability provisions and escaped disqualification but was fined $2000.
McGrath and Burrows have appealed.
The committee made it clear with McGrath's sentence that it was sending out a message. Nothing was more likely to destroy racing's integrity than doping, it said. The industry's crackdown on drugs was well-publicised and the Blue Magic scandal was causing considerable damage.
Mark Purdon was charged on the same day as McGrath - June 2 - and two further charges were laid last week. But following Seaton's death, a hearing scheduled for next month is expected to be postponed.
The Weekend Herald understands that a statement Purdon gave to police early in its inquiry led to him, and later Seaton, being charged with breaching harness racing rules. He is understood to have said Light And Sound was given a substance before racing on two occasions to help its performance, but that he didn't believe it to be banned. It was done at Seaton's behest and the substance was provided by Asquith.
A horse broker has said he'd had ongoing discussions with Seaton about buying Light And Sound, including around the time the substance was given to the horse. This was an aspect that authorities made inquiries about.
The horse ran first and third but, intriguingly, did not test positive for Blue Magic or any other drug. But the charges last week related to alleged doping and bringing the industry into disrepute.
In common with most of those caught in the Blue Magic net, Seaton believed the investigation and possible consequences were out of all proportion to the alleged crime. He told Herald racing editor Michael Guerin he was not involved in any hands-on way with the horses and was a victim of industry jealousy.
But Edward Rennell's response this week was telling: the industry could not have one rule for its elite and one for the majority of struggling owners and trainers.
With two key players dead, what may never be known is whether there was more to the Blue Magic scandal than trainers breaching the rules, unwittingly or not, in search of that extra edge.
In Victoria, there was talk of a racket whereby trainers were offered Blue Magic for $200 a dose but got a hefty discount if they told the supplier which horse it was to be used on.
"Obviously it must be performance-enhancing," an anonymous Victorian trainer told Melbourne's Herald Sun, "if they are so keen to know which horse is going to be hit."
The alleged main supplier, Asquith, was an inveterate gambler. Seaton claimed to be a casual acquaintance of Asquith, but some have questioned whether it was more than that. The two had been seen gambling at the same time in the high-rollers' room in the Christchurch casino.
Asquith, 47, was rumoured to be involved in doping horses, then betting on them. He relinquished his training licences in 1994 and began selling vitamins, according to the Christchurch Press, but was fined $1600 for illegally importing a hormonal drug from Canada. Subsequent enterprises included a male escort service.
After time in Queensland, he bought a Ballarat property, reportedly from gambling winnings. His wife, Jill, trained gallopers in Victoria from 2000 with moderate success. She notched one winner each season from fewer than 20 starts, but came unstuck last year when one of her horses, Cheeky Chicoloa, was found with an illegally high bicarbonate reading.
As a first offender, she was fined the minimum of $6620. The pair returned to New Zealand after her appeal failed last November, settling back in Oxford, where her husband had previously trained.
To friends, Robert Asquith was a likeable rogue. To others he was just a rogue.
"Anyone who deals with this man does so at his own peril," was Edward Rennell's comment about the then-unnamed supplier of Blue Magic after the May raids. That person was unmasked as Asquith when he was charged by police later that month with selling a restricted medicine.
Five months later, lacking evidence for betting fraud charges, police handed their files to Harness Racing NZ.
Racing: Blue Magic and the trail of death
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