An investigation conducted by the Horseracing Integrity and Welfare Unit into the capabilities of the drug-testing laboratory at the University of Kentucky found that the lab was out of compliance with a handful of HIWU’s rules and that the former lab director had lied about certain test results, according to a report released by HIWU on Tuesday. The report, which was produced after a six-month investigation, laid heavy blame for the deficiencies on the former lab director, Dr. Scott Stanley, who was removed from his position in February by the university, citing an “ongoing personnel investigation.” At that time, the Horseracing Integrity and Safety Authority, which contracts with HIWU to enforce its drug-testing program, dropped the Kentucky lab from its list of contracted drug-testing facilities. In one glaring instance, according to the report, HIWU delivered an out-of-competition sample to the Kentucky lab in November of last year with the direction that the sample be tested for erythropoietin, the powerful blood-doping drug. In late December and again in January, Stanley told HIWU personnel that the sample had been tested and retested, with no detection of the drug. However, after the investigation began in March, HIWU personnel discovered that the sample had never been tested and was in fact “still sealed in [the lab’s] storage refrigerator.” Investigators later discovered that the lab did not have a verified method to detect EPO and that its equipment to perform the test was “inoperable.” :: Subscribe to the DRF Post Time Email Newsletter: Get the news you need to play today's races!  Ben Mosier, the executive director of HIWU, said during a conference call on Tuesday afternoon that the “intentional misrepresentation” underlying the EPO incident, which was discovered in mid-February, led directly to the larger investigation. On the same conference call, Liza Lazarus, the chief executive officer of HISA, said that the “institutional problems” at the UK lab predated the launch of HISA, and she noted that the problems did not stem from “outdated equipment” or technicians who were unable to perform their jobs. “This was instead the case of a lab director who substituted his own judgements for the standards, rules, and protocols that had been agreed on,” Lazarus said. The report noted that prior to the EPO incident, officials at HIWU, HISA, and other laboratories had experienced consistent problems when communicating with Stanley and his staff at the UK lab. Beginning with the launch of HISA’s Anti-Doping and Medication Control (ADMC) program in May 2023, “the behavior of Dr. Stanley and some of his staff at [the lab] was challenging,” the report said. “They failed to acknowledge emails from HIWU staff with respect to matters critical to the operation of the ADMC program and were unresponsive to requests and other questions from HIWU, resulting in the need for repeated follow-up and escalation by HIWU,” the report said. “In addition, there was a level of incivility in their communications to HIWU staff that was frequently unprofessional.” In addition to the communication problems, the lab was frequently late in delivering results of its testing and often failed to properly submit reports on its work to the HISA databases, the report said. The report also detailed a complete breakdown in relations between Stanley and personnel involved in sample collection in Florida and some employees of the Florida Gaming Control Commission, which resulted in some of the employees threatening to resign. The Florida samples were eventually redirected to Industrial Labs in Colorado. :: Bet the races with a $200 First Deposit Match + FREE All Access PPs! Join DRF Bets. Stanley was brought in to run the laboratory in 2018 after 30 years at a testing laboratory of the University of California Davis. He has been known as one of the foremost experts in the realm of equine drug-testing for decades. After he was removed from his position at the University of Kentucky lab, he was given a position at UK’s Gluck Equine Research Center, where he has continued to work on a project to develop a “biological passport” that would aid in advanced testing for prohibited substances. UK released a statement on Tuesday after the HIWU report was released saying that it was seeking to remove Stanley from his post. The statement said that Stanley “did not follow appropriate business practices in reporting equine drug tests and did not honor certain standards and obligations” and that the university would be exploring how to revoke his tenure. "Given the serious breach of ethics and policy violations, we have now initiated the process to revoke Stanley's tenure as a faculty member, with the intention of terminating him as a university employee," said Nancy Cox, the dean of UK’s College of Agriculture, in the statement. Cox was a co-chair of HISA’s Nominating Committee when the authority was formed in early 2021. The HIWU report released Tuesday said that Stanley and his counsel refused requests for interviews in relation to the investigation. Investigators interviewed 15 “current or former” employees of the lab, the report said, and received “extensive documentation” from the lab. The report also said that an audit of the lab’s testing results under the ADMC program discovered that the lab had found evidence of a possible controlled or illegal substance in 146 samples that were instead reported as negative. Under normal circumstances, the samples would have been subjected to a confirmatory test, but the results were never subjected to additional testing, the report said. Stanley “alone made decisions as to whether to send samples to confirmatory analysis,” the report said, which called that protocol an “arbitrary and unsubstantiated selection criteria.” Because many of the samples had been discarded, had degraded, or did not have enough material for retesting, HIWU was only able to retest 36 of the 146 samples, the report said. Of those 36, HIWU found two samples that had evidence of controlled medications, both of which would not require suspensions. Both cases will be “adjudicated,” HIWU said in the report. A separate batch of samples that the Kentucky lab sent to other accredited labs for confirmatory testing should not have been retested, according to the report, because the initial findings were not above the “screening limit” for the substances. Screening limits are regulatory thresholds at which some substances are not considered a violation. HIWU will expunge the violations based on those results and return any forfeited purse monies. Both cases did not result in any suspensions, the report said. :: Get Daily Racing Form Past Performances – the exclusive home of Beyer Speed Figures Lazarus said during the conference call that HISA is currently in talks with the UK lab about reimbursing over $1 million in billings for tests that were never performed. The report concluded by saying that the lab’s operations remain under an “open investigation.” The lab has been under new management for several months, and an accreditation review for the lab is ongoing, according to a separate section of the report. “The goals of HIWU’s investigation of the performance of [the lab] were to protect the integrity of the ADMC program process, the interests of covered persons, and the welfare of covered horses,” the report said. “As a result, HISA and HIWU consider this investigation to be an open one for the foreseeable future. All available evidence has been secured for this purpose, and additional action may be taken by HISA and/or HIWU.” :: Want to learn more about handicapping and wagering? Check out DRF's Handicapping 101 and Wagering 101 pages.