A controversial sports biochemist says an organised crime network wanted him to spike AFL players' supplements with illicit drugs as part of a plan to blackmail them into joining a match-fixing ring.
Shane Charter, a central figure in the Essendon drug investigation, has decided to ignore legal advice and speak publicly after he was threatened, bashed, had his home burgled and a family pet killed since his name has been linked to the supplement program. ''I just wanted to disappear and keep my head down but after what has happened I think my best defence is to shout out from the rooftops,'' he said.
In a series of interviews with Fairfax Media, he says he:
Charter during his drug-tainted body-building and power lifting career. Photo: Supplied
- Provided the head of the Essendon supplement program, Stephen Dank, with ASADA-banned peptides sourced from China.
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- Has seen blood test results that showed AFL players (not linked to Essendon's program) took banned performance-enhancing products.
- Used independent laboratory drug analyses to warn Australian Olympic athletes to pull out of events because they would fail competition day tests.
Shane Charter with Essendon's James Hird with whom he worked on the club's supplements program. Photo: Supplied
''The ACC [Australian Crime Commission report on crime links to sport] is right but they have just scratched the surface,'' Charter said.
He said he was prepared to give evidence to the ASADA inquiry. ''If I want to be part of the solution, then I should co-operate with them.''
Charter also said he was asked to provide footballers' confidential blood test results to professional punters wanting ''inside information'' on players' fitness.
And he revealed he heard Essendon coach James Hird tell Dank he must protect the health of his players, adhere to drug regulations and liaise with club doctor Bruce Reid.
Charter, who worked with Hird in 2003 as a strength and nutrition adviser, said the coach was a stickler for remaining within the rules.
''Whenever I gave him a supplement he would ring the doctor and read the label to him to make sure it didn't contain any banned substances,'' he said. ''He is an intelligent man, and I doubt he would be a voluntary party to player doping.''
He said he heard Dank claim at an Essendon pre-season training camp in Queensland in December 2011 that he suspected another AFL club was using human growth hormones. He also saw Hird tell the sports scientist he wanted his club to remain within the rules.
Charter said Hird laid down three conditions. ''That there were no long-term dangers to players' health, that it was all WADA compliant and that everything had to be run past the club doctor. He was adamant.''
Charter, a former world-class power lifter, admits to using steroids and human growth hormones when he competed internationally.
''I used every performance enhancing drug I was considering recommending to athletes so that I would personally know the physical and psychological effects,'' he said.
As a result, he had a heart attack at the age of 32, and surgeons said he was lucky to survive.
He was arrested in 2004 over the importation 100,000 Malaysian pseudoephedrine tablets. He pleaded guilty and was sentenced to four years with a minimum of two.
He said he had been part of a group importing steroids to be sold in the gym black market and then ''stupidly'' moved into the amphetamines market. ''I learnt my lesson and have kept my nose clean ever since.''
Charter said gangsters asked him to spike players' supplements with cocaine so the blood tests he ordered could be used for blackmail. ''They also wanted inside information from our data to see which players would play well.''
He said he refused to co-operate.
The biochemist, who also uses the marketing name ''Dr Ageless'', said he provided Dank with Chinese peptides, including human growth stimulators Hexarelin, CJC-1295 and Thymosin Beta-4, plus at least four other muscle-building and recovery products popular with bodybuilders.
When Dank worked at NRL club Cronulla in 2011, some players were given supplements, including the human growth stimulant CJC-1295, which has since been banned by WADA. The sports scientist said he did nothing illegal while working for the Sharks.
Charter has an email from an independent expert warning that if the Chinese peptides were given to AFL players it would breach all sports drug regulations and would be ''horribly wrong''.
Charter said the peptides were not sent directly to Dank but delivered to South Yarra compounding chemist Nima Alavi, who spent $50,000 to build a sterile unit where supplements could be prepared. ''Dank would order a batch and pick them up personally,'' Charter said.
ASADA is investigating if any of the controversial peptides provided by Charter were used in the Essendon supplement program.
Dank has consistently denied injecting Essendon players with banned substances, and maintains he has always worked within sports' drug regulations. Fairfax Media has seen no evidence to contradict the claims.
Charter said he stopped supplying Dank with peptides in late April last year after the sports scientist missed payment deadlines.
He said the $30,000 was eventually paid from the account of a Sydney anti-ageing clinic connected with Dank. The money was then split between Charter and Alavi.
It has been reported that Essendon sacked Dank when he exceeded the club's supplement budget by $100,000.
Read more:
http://www.smh.com.au/afl/afl-news/...lly-exposed-20130419-2i632.html#ixzz2QwhtgLgq
