New positive test as crisis deepens for Jamaica duo

Back-up doping tests have come back positive for former 100 metres world record-holder Asafa Powell, team-mate 
Sherone Simpson and three other Jamaican athletes.

The Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission said the athletes’ second samples were tested at a Montreal lab accredited by the World Anti-Doping Agency. It said all five athletes had been notified and the findings would be passed on to the Jamaican Anti-Doping Disciplinary Panel so hearings could be scheduled.

Powell and Simpson tested positive for the banned stimulant oxilofrone at Jamaica’s 
national championships in June. Discus throwers Allison Randall and Travis Smikle, along with a junior athlete, also tested positive for prohibited substances at the same meet.

Powell was the last man to hold the 100m world record before team-mate Usain Bolt broke it in 2008 on the way to his first batch of three Olympic golds.

Simpson won Olympic gold in the women’s relay in 2004 and silver in 2012, along with silver in the 100m in 2008.

The two sprinting stars and trainer Christopher Xuereb were formally placed under criminal investigation in Italy following a hotel raid in July in the northern resort town of Lignano Sabbidadora, where the Jamaicans have been training for years.

This week, an Italian prosecutor said their criminal doping investigation has been delayed because they had been unable to contact the athletes to ask whether they wished to observe the testing of substances sequestered during the police raid.

Meanwhile, a Jamaican disciplinary panel is deliberating a verdict after a four-day hearing on a positive doping test by another marquee sprinter, three-time Olympic gold medallist 
Veronica Campbell-Brown.

The 31-year-old was suspended from competition in June after testing positive for a banned diuretic at a meet in May in Jamaica. But her doping case appears to involve a “lesser” 
offence of unintentional use of a banned substance.