World 100 metres record holder Tim Montgomery has received a letter from the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) alleging doping violations, his lawyer said on Tuesday.
Montgomery, the partner of triple Olympic champion Marion Jones, is the highest profile athlete so far to be named by the agency as receiving a letter since it started investigating the BALCO laboratory in the San Francisco area.
"Today we received a letter from USADA indicating that it has initiated proceedings alleging that Tim Montgomery has violated its rules," Montgomery's attorney Cristina Arguedas said in a statement. "Tim Montgomery has not done anything wrong and we intend to fight any attempt to prevent him from running in the Olympics."
Also on Tuesday, the attorney for American sprinter Chryste Gaines, a member of the 1996 Olympic 4x100 relay gold medal winning team, told Reuters he had received a USADA letter charging her with a doping violation.
"We have received a letter from USADA." Cameron Myler said. "The letter has charged Chryste with a doping violation based on documents obtained in the BALCO investigation."
Myler said she had not had time to review the letter to discuss specifics including the type of doping violation Gaines has been charged with.
Under USADA guidelines, the initial letter starts a process that could lead to sanctions against an athlete.
After a meeting between Montgomery and Jones with USADA officials two weeks ago, her lawyers showed Reuters and other journalists copies of calendars, ledgers and other BALCO documents the agency believes detail drugs use.
UNFAIR PROCESS
Arguedas criticised the USADA evidence.
"The evidence we have been shown by USADA that we are still reviewing is inconclusive and internally inconsistent," she said. "There is also no foundational evidence to prove where it comes from and what it means."
"It is fundamentally unfair to take away an athlete's reputation, his work and his dream based on meager information, flimsy documents and a flawed process.
"Tim Montgomery has done nothing wrong and he should have the right to run in the Olympics and the United States should have the right to put its best athletes on our Olympic team."
In a statement issued through her attorney Jones, who competed in a meeting in Ostrava, Czech Republic, on Tuesday, said she supported and believed in Montgomery.
"I have no doubt that if a fair process is applied that Tim will be racing for gold in Athens this August," she said.
Rich Wanninger, a spokesman for USADA in Colorado Springs, Colorado, declined to comment.
Travis Tygart, USADA's legal affairs director, told Reuters on Monday that his agency hoped to complete its review of suspected competitors by the July 9-18 track and field trials for the U.S. Olympic team in Sacramento, California.
The man at the centre of the scandal, BALCO founder Victor Conte, met prosecutors last week to discuss a possible plea bargain deal. No deal has been reached.
Gaines and double world sprint champion Kelli White also tested positive for the simulant modafinil at last year's U.S. trials. Gaines, 33, is coached by Remi Korchemny, one of four men who include Conte indicted by a federal grand jury investigating BALCO.
White has been stripped of the world 100 and 200 titles she won in Paris last year after accepting a two-year suspension based on evidence obtained by USADA.
Three other Americans, shot putter Kevin Toth and hammer throwers John McEwen and Melissa Price has been banned after testing positive for the designer steroid THG (tetrahydrogestrinone). World indoor 1,500 metres record holder Regina Jacobs is appealing against a positive test for the drug.
(Additional reporting by Gene Cherry)
