Racing: Osborne fined twice by the Jockey Club
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Your support makes all the difference.For once it was Jamie Osborne and not one of the horses at his Kingsdown yard which had the long face yesterday. The Upper Lambourn trainer admitted he had been a bit of a silly boy after he was fined £4,000 by the Jockey Club disciplinary committee for bringing racing into disrepute. It was a similar punishment, handed out for a similar offence, to Ferdy Murphy last month.
Like Murphy, Osborne was disciplined for the unguarded comments he made on the BBC's Kenyon Confronts documentary in June. During the broadcast, Osborne told an undercover reporter claiming to be a potential owner that he would be prepared to "cheat" and that he knew of an "in-house" jockey who could assist in the plan. In a hearing lasting about 40 minutes, Osborne admitted the charge.
The documentary entitled "They Fix Races, Don't They?" claimed to expose alleged cheating in racing after secretly filming Murphy, Osborne and a third trainer, David Wintle, whose case is likely to be heard next month.
"I would like to place on record my most sincere apologies to the industry for the part I have unwittingly played in the recent detrimental publicity that racing has suffered," Osborne said yesterday. "It was not, and never will be, my intention to take part in any activity that would be damaging to racing. I hope very much that time and my continued commitment to training will erode the memory of this embarrassing episode."
At yesterday's hearing, the disciplinary committee "considered whether or not Osborne has acted in a manner which was prejudicial to the integrity, proper conduct or good reputation of horseracing in Great Britain, in respect of the conversations portrayed in the BBC production Kenyon Confronts between himself and reporters from the programme purporting to be potential owners."
Earlier in the day, Osborne was fined £500 after being found in breach of Rule 51 (i) concerning the decision to send Lanos to Redcar on the afternoon of 21 June in order to run the gelding the next day.
The horse had already been examined that morning by a vet and declared unfit to run at Goodwood that evening with a "high temperature".
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