The process


The first time in my life in court. Sports court of the DTU (German triathlon union) in Frankfurt, Otto-Fleck-Schneise, same address as DTU the offices.
Tense atmosphere, standing around, waiting. Herr Wilke, DTU vice-president and judge Mahn are looking for a room. A half hour later they find a room, and the process can begin.

The disciplinary commission had banned me from racing in September with a document. My lawyer, Dr. Lehner had questioned, if the signatures where authentic. Now in court we have to find out they were not. They had been copied on the paper. The judge explains, that a document, with copied signatures is not legal. It had no value, I had never been banned.

Now here was the situation: There had never been a ban. There had never been a legal decision from commission. I could have canceled today’s court hearing. The commission would have to meet, make a decision and ban me. Then I could go back to court, probably 4months later.

I did not want that. My goal had been to get cleared and the case dismissed today. I want to get back to training and racing and not spend my time in court.

I had two choices I could have believed in the DTU judge, and hope he would not accept the test result of the B-test and clear my name.
If I would get cleared in the DTU court today, I could have gone to civil court. Mr. Lehner told me my chances where very good. But he also informed me it could take up to two years. And in the end I would have been cleared because of illegal procedures in my case. Would that really help me? The reason for the positive doping test results would still not be known. We will never really know, what really happened.

I have no chance to find out. The chance for an athlete to find out and to prove his/her innocence is the B-test. The DTU took this chance away from me. They denied the DNA test. They did not allow my lawyer and the scientist I had hired to be there.
Herr Lehner, my lawyer and Herr Heim, a scientist would have found out about the open containers and a DNA test would have had to be done. Do make sure it was my sample. Then they would have asked for a test for yeast and bacteria, because yeast in the sample can cause testosterone to develop in the sample (see witness Prof. Dr. Franke).

Was it my urine? Did the sample go bad? We could have known.

We did not find out about the open containers until one week before the hearing. We had asked for the laboratory report 4 month ago.

Let’s think it was my urine and there was no yeast in the sample. I had searched for answers together with my lawyer and scientist for month now:
It could have been supplements or manipulation. I do not want to believe that. With supplements the testosterone, would have been in my body for a long time, and I believe I would have noticed that. And I just do not like to think of somebody anipulating my bottles.

Back to the case:
1. The chance to PROVE my innocence was TAKEN AWAY from me.
2. The open samples cannot be taken as prove.
3. Rules had been broken by the DTU, procedures where not followed properly.

I accepted a “deal”, because it was most important to me to be cleared of all doping accusations and to finish the process.
The DTU agreed to waive all sanctions against me and had to pay for the court cost. I, in return, agreed to start racing DTU triathlons and duathlons in June.

It all seamed great. I was very happy.

Then
Herr Wilke, vice president of the DTU published an untrue press statement: He said: “Katja Schumacher’s ban shortened form 12 to 10 month…” This is false! I am not banned and have never been banned.
They took it off the DTU website on Sunday after I told them to, but the damage had been done. Newspapers wrote: “Katja Schumacher convicted for doping…”

Then
Kurt Denk, organizer puts out a press release full of lies and scratched me of the results list of Ironman Frankfurt. Without any legal rights. He took the press release back after a letter from my lawyer.
I have to sue him now. I demand to be reinstated into 2nd place for Ironman Frankfurt 04 and to receive my price money. Also Kurt Denk has to retract the untrue statements and refrain from further.

I will focus on training and racing again from now on. My lawyer, Dr. Lehner will take care of all the legal matters.



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