SALON

Wednesday, Oct 3, 2012 5:00 PM UTC

UCI hails defamation case win vs cyclist Landis

By

Topics: From the Wires,

UCI hails defamation case win vs cyclist LandisFILE - This Aug. 24, 2012 file photo shows Floyd Landis, right, and his attorney, Leo Cunningham, leaving federal court in San Diego. The International Cycling Union says it won a Swiss court ruling prohibiting Landis from repeating claims that its leaders corruptly protected Lance Armstrong from a doping case. The governing body says the defamation judgment "upholds and protects the integrity of the UCI and its presidents." (AP Photo/Lenny Ignelzi, File)(Credit: AP)

GENEVA (AP) — The International Cycling Union said a Swiss court ruling has prohibited Floyd Landis from repeating claims that UCI leaders corruptly protected Lance Armstrong from a doping case.

“The judgment upholds and protects the integrity of the UCI and its presidents,” the world cycling body said Wednesday in a statement released with copies of the court document.

In a Sept. 26 ruling on the defamation case published Wednesday by the UCI, Landis is ordered to pay UCI President Pat McQuaid and predecessor Hein Verbruggen $10,667 each, plus legal costs totaling $4,900.

The ruling forbids Landis from stating that “Patrick (Pat) McQuaid and/or Henricus (Hein) Verbruggen have concealed cases of doping, received money for doing so, have accepted money from Lance Armstrong to conceal a doping case, have protected certain racing cyclists (and) concealed cases of doping.”

Landis is also required to pay to announce the judgment in the Wall Street Journal, French sports daily L’Equipe and several cycling websites. The daily De Volksrant in Verbruggen’s native Netherlands and Geneva daily Le Temps are also included on the court’s list.

Landis, who was stripped of the 2006 Tour de France title for doping, was sued in the district court in Vevey — near the UCI’s headquarters in Aigle — after telling a German television station in November 2010 that the UCI protected some star riders from doping claims.

Landis has been given 10 days from receiving the court ruling to appeal, after which “the judgment shall become final and binding.”

The document, headlined as a “Judgment by Default,” stated that he could faces fines for failing to comply. However, Landis was not an active party in the civil court proceedings and it remains unclear how the orders would be enforced.

The same court is scheduled to hear another defamation case brought by the UCI against Irish journalist Paul Kimmage on Dec. 12.

Kimmage, a former Tour de France rider and anti-doping campaigner, has claimed the UCI and its leaders protected Armstrong from an alleged positive test for the blood-boosting hormone EPO at the 2001 Tour of Switzerland.

The UCI sued Kimmage last month after he made comments to L’Equipe and published an interview with Landis in British newspaper The Sunday Times.

“False accusations are unacceptable and unlawful, and the UCI will continue to defend itself against all such accusations,” the governing body said Wednesday.

An American cycling website, cyclismas.com, launched a defense fund to help pay Kimmage’s legal fees. On Wednesday, it had pledges of more than $50,000.

More Graham Dunbar.

Next Article

Related Stories

More Related Stories

Featured Slide Shows

The week in 10 pics

close X
  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11
  • Lisa Montgomery embraces her nephew Thursday after a tornado tore apart her home in Cleburne, Texas. The twister killed six people and destroyed entire swaths of the North Texas town.
    Credit: AP/LM Otero

  • Jack McMahon, the defense attorney for abortion doctor Kermit Gosnell, speaks outside the Criminal Justice Center in Philadelphia Tuesday. His client was convicted of killing three babies in his clinic, and will serve multiple life sentences.
    Credit: AP/Matt Rourke

  • A photo taken Monday captures Vice President Joe Biden's response to a Milwaukee second-grader's innovative proposal to end America's epidemic of gun violence. This guy!
    Credit: AP/Jenny Aicher

  • Sen. Rand Paul, R-Ky., flanked by a grouper-eyed Michele Bachmann, addresses the IRS' admission that it targeted Tea Party groups in advance of the 2012 election. In an op-ed for CNN Thursday, the Kentucky senator slammed the president for his faux outrage.
    Credit: AP/Molly Riley

  • Ousted IRS chief Steven Miller is sworn in on Capitol Hill Friday. Miller testified before the House Ways and Means Committee on the extra scrutiny the agency gave conservative groups applying for tax-exempt status.
    Credit: AP/J. Scott Applewhite

  • Attorney General Eric Holder pauses as he testifies on Capitol Hill before the House Judiciary Committee Wednesday. Holder is under fire, among other things, for the Justice Department's gathering of phone records at the Associated Press.
    Credit: AP/Carolyn Kaster

  • O.J. Simpson sits during an evidentiary hearing at Clark County District Court in Las Vegas, Nev., Thursday. Simpson, who is currently serving a nine-to-33-year sentence in state prison for armed robbery and kidnapping, is using a writ of habeas corpus to seek a new trial.
    Credit: AP/Las Vegas Review-Journal/Jeff Scheid

  • Major Tom to ground control: On Sunday astronaut Chris Hadfield recorded the first music video from space, a cover of David Bowie's "Space Oddity."
    Credit: AP/NASA/Chris Hadfield

  • When it rains it pours. President Barack Obama speaks during a news conference Thursday with Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, inexplicably inspiring an #umbrellagate Twitter meme.
    Credit: AP/Jacquelyn Martin

  • A smoke plume rises high above a road block at the intersection of County A and Ross Road east of Solon Springs, Wis., Tuesday. No injuries were reported, but the the wildfire caused evacuations across northwestern Wisconsin.
    Credit: AP/The Duluth News-Tribune/Clint Austin

  • Recent Slide Shows

  • Share on Twitter
  • Share on Facebook
  • Thumbnails
  • Fullscreen
  • 1 of 11

Related Videos

Comments

 0 Comments

Comment Preview

Your name will appear as username

You may use these HTML tags and attributes: <a href=""> <b> <em> <strong> <i> <blockquote>

follow salon

Most Read

Popular on Reddit

links from salon.com

From Around the Web

Presented by Scribol
listener_new_rect The Listener: Chekhov's story mirrors Russia's own

Recommendations