Kenyan paper: Athletics Kenya official asks for doping to be declared a treasonable offense - which requires the death penalty

I think you should be banned for 3 days to know how it feels.

It is probably not fair but it would likely help deter the doping problem.

As Long as it is for ALL Sports At ALL Levels I am Fine with It. The NFL Players Association Should Push for this, Because in Contact Sports which are Dangerous as far as causing Injuries, For someone to make themselves artificially is almost like making themselves a weapon. We (USA) have always been The Highest Trust Country and known for fair play and Sportsmanship, For someone from the USA are making us look bad and it is not fair. I want Americans To Win Gold Medals and Break World Records solely on Hard Work not PED's

Douglas, are you okay? You’re using a lot of unnecessary capitalization these days.

Surely ioc, wada, etc would not permit this. They'd have to ban them for such a policy.

supragraf wrote:

Douglas, are you okay? You’re using a lot of unnecessary capitalization these days.

I feel Great.

Whatever it takes.

But given that they dope ro feed their families or even to 'feed the village', perhaps employ the Israeli system of demolishing the village of the doper?

Actually, there is a case for bringing in the death penalty for the managers and coaches of dopers, especially when young East African runners are still.dropping dead of 'mysterious illnesses'.

Maybe bring in punishments for those who watch, defend or glamourise Kenyan dopers? Just as we prosecute those involved in the demand for illegal drugs or porn, we should put in prison those who defend dopers, ceelebrate Kenyan performances, or who even claim that Kenyans in general have a 'running gene' and thereby mask and apologize for the doping ('they would dominate anyway').

rojo wrote:

I've always thought doping should be prosecuted by the authorities as at a minimum one is committing a felony in terms of theft, but had never imagined going this far.

Daily Nation wrote:

As the country grapples with increasing number of athletes violating anti-doping regulations, a top Athletics Kenya (AK) official has urged the government to declare the vice a treasonable offence.....

According to AK South Rift Valley branch chairperson John Wachira, the harsh penalty will deter athletes from ever thinking of cheating or using banned performance-enhancing drugs.

Treason is covered under Chapter Seven of the Laws of Kenya on offenses against public order and attracts a death sentence.

Now Kenyan papers are known for producing some showy quotes and author never produces a quote where the guy asks for it to be treason but he is later quoted asking for jail time.

What do you think?

(I'm no lawyer but) most countries already have laws against fraud and theft, so it doesn't seem like they would have to enact specific legislation to prosecute doping as a crime.

Even in the US, where athletes are sensitized and educated about doping in sports, "according to Athlete Ombudsman for the US Olympic Committee John Ruger ..., between 40-60% of positive test doping results were inadvertent (non-deliberate) cases."

You can imagine the same holds true in Kenya -- many athletes and even doctors, are unaware of the strict doping requirements and restrictions placed on the athletes, resulting in normal treatment of sickness running a high risk of inadvertent violation. It would be tragic to sentence such athletes to death, or to discourage basic health care for athletes.

Such harsh legislation should include several elements which must be proven to a higher standard to establish that such use was intentional, and not inadvertent. Prosecuting crimes fairly with due process would also more expensive, for both prosecuting and defending, and justice would be even lengthier than in the current anti-doping environment, which is already expensive and lengthy.

I'm all for harsher punishments for doping, cheating, and fraud, but it seems smarter to promote education and awareness, at least in parallel, and to consider creative ideas as global funding for anti-doping in countries like Kenya, where local funding is scarce, yet the pool of talented athletes is high. After all, who are the beneficiaries of Kenyan anti-doping? Kenya or its competitors? Shouldn't the beneficiaries be expected to pay? It also seems smarter to go after non-athletes too, that enabled the doping, in order to disrupt the doping supply infrastructure.

No, doping shouldn't be prosecuted by authorities at all, except in the context of their general statutory drug prohibitions. For example, they catch you with EPO and it's illegal to possess, fine. But you fail a drug test, that's not usually punishable in and of itself.

And they shouldn't pass statutes about doping in sports because the issue is fundamentally one of trust between the sports federations and the fans and other competitors. Nobody minds if someone uses steroids who isn't involved in a competitive sport. One might argue that one athlete in a league defrauds or steals from another by doping, but only if one is ignorant of the failure of the league to deal with the problem. And most leagues are complicit, at least by looking the other way for "protected" athletes.

Pro athletes are fully aware from the start that eventually they'll be up against doped competition if they reach the top level, so it's hard to claim they were denied fair play when it was never truly offered in the first place. As for the fan, the complaint boils down to product satisfaction - you don't like watching doped athletes, bummer, find another form of entertainment.

Coevett wrote:

Whatever it takes.

But given that they dope ro feed their families or even to 'feed the village', perhaps employ the Israeli system of demolishing the village of the doper?

Actually, there is a case for bringing in the death penalty for the managers and coaches of dopers, especially when young East African runners are still.dropping dead of 'mysterious illnesses'.

Maybe bring in punishments for those who watch, defend or glamourise Kenyan dopers? Just as we prosecute those involved in the demand for illegal drugs or porn, we should put in prison those who defend dopers, ceelebrate Kenyan performances, or who even claim that Kenyans in general have a 'running gene' and thereby mask and apologize for the doping ('they would dominate anyway').

Is this some kind of dark British satire? You would demolish entire villages, and put fans of the sport of the sport in prison for the crime of noticing obvious patterns and trends?

Prosecuting crimes to conviction requires a much higher standard of proof than you apply.

Interesting outlook.

One can argue that outside of the sport, there are other issues too -- a small percentage of Kenyan dopers cause reputational damage to all Kenyan athletes, resulting in a real loss of opportunities, and causing harm at a national level.

rekrunner wrote:

One can argue that outside of the sport, there are other issues too -- a small percentage of Kenyan dopers cause reputational damage to all Kenyan athletes, resulting in a real loss of opportunities, and causing harm at a national level.

"Small percentage of Kenyan dopers?" ???

bad nights with you wrote:

It is probably not fair but it would likely help deter the doping problem.

It is well documented across different cultures that harsher sentences do not deter breaking the law.

Especially when the pay off from breaking the law could be prosperity and wealth for your family.

No, dopers defraud the fans. I mean real fans, not the type here who often celebrate obvious dopers and wouldn't care if the likes of Kiprop had petrol in their blood and an engine under their shorts.

Young runners might know that there are cheats at the top, it doesn't mean they are not being defrauded when they lose to cheats.

A teen runner in 85 coukd well believe that most at the top were clean. By the time he peaked in 1995, it was a whole different world.

A young British runner today has reasonable hope the sport is being finally cleaned up and that he can compete on a fairly even playing field with East Africans. But you say - 'let them dope' - largely because you assume everybody dopes and always has.

roadman wrote:

bad nights with you wrote:

It is probably not fair but it would likely help deter the doping problem.

It is well documented across different cultures that harsher sentences do not deter breaking the law.

Especially when the pay off from breaking the law could be prosperity and wealth for your family.

Not sure that's true. You have to compare within cultures not between cultures. Because Switzerland has low crime and a 'soft' penal code, and Somalia has high crime and a harsh penal code, says nothing.

Singapore seems to be an example of a strict penal code working.

You might be right in that young Kenyan runners are so desperate and sometimes uneducated as to fully understand the risks. That's why the often European managers and coaches should be the ones who are punished most harshly.

Lol, many people here think that my posting about Kenyan doping leads directly to the return of the Nazis and black slavery and would like to see me dead.

In Europe, new thought crimes are being added to the legal code every day. Why shouldn't defending or denying East African doping be added to them?Particularly when young Africans are dropping dead likely because of doping?

Notice also that it's clear from these Kenyan news articles that Kenyans themselves don't deny a doping problem, or that it is tarnishing Kenya's reputation. Only white people here such as El K and you do that.

Barrel of Laughs wrote:

rekrunner wrote:

One can argue that outside of the sport, there are other issues too -- a small percentage of Kenyan dopers cause reputational damage to all Kenyan athletes, resulting in a real loss of opportunities, and causing harm at a national level.

"Small percentage of Kenyan dopers?" ???

Well this is coming from Rek, who still claims nothing was unearthed in the Sabadell raids.

That applied here in the US would be the end of Major League Baseball, National Football League, MMA/UFC, National Hockey League, USA Track and Field, NCAA, you name it.