Park City Daily News – On Kentucky Derby night 2012 someone murdered Adan Perez. The groom’s body was found in a backside barn at Churchill Downs. No arrest has happened, and almost two years later the case has grown cold.
This sad and unresolved situation is symbolic of so much in thoroughbred horse racing now. Despite plenty of positive (as chronicled in a preceding column) there are several serious problems that prevent racing from reaching its full potential and returning to its past position in the pantheon of America’s most popular sports.
One stark reminder of racing’s darker side is distracting fans from Keeneland’s Spring Meet, the thrilling Kentucky Derby and Oaks prep races, and Kentucky Derby Festival fun. The New York Times recently reported about an undercover investigation at Churchill Downs by People for the Ethical Treatment of Animals that says racing’s second all-time winningest trainer, Steve Asmussen, and his then-top assistant, Scott Blasi, “of subjecting their horses to cruel and injurious treatments, administering drugs to them for nontherapeutic purposes, and having one of their jockeys use an electrical device to shock horses into running faster.”
PETA filed a complaint with Kentucky racing officials accusing Asmussen of forcing “injured and/or suffering horses to race and train.” The Times also reports that PETA claims Asmussen employed “undocumented workers, requiring them to use false names on Internal Revenue Service forms, and conspiring with Blasi to produce false identification documents, according to the complaints filed with state and federal agencies,” as well as violating wage and hour laws.
