Racing comes under TV spotlight
11 June 2002
Race fixing is the subject of TV programme Kenyon Confronts on BBC 1 tonight
Undercover reporters trying to expose race fixing for a BBC investigative series duped two leading racehorse trainers by pretending to be potential racehorse owners.
Ferdy Murphy and Jamie Osborne were approached by the BBC’s Kenyon Confronts and asked to find a suitable horse for a gambling coup. It is alleged they were being secretly filmed while being asked how to stop horses to get them favourably handicapped.
Ferdy was approached last November at Newbury and was contacted again in February. He says he will take legal action against the BBC if he is misrepresented in tonight’s programme (11 June), which is being screened at 9.30pm.
The Middleham-based trainer says he is a victim of “deliberate entrapment”.
Osborne, who was arrested and subsequently released during the doping and race-fixing inquiry two years ago, admits to being taken in by the Kenyon Report expose team.
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The National Trainers’ Federation has issued a statement saying that a further two other trainers David Wintle and Dudley Moffat may also be involved in the programme. All four have been advised to seek legal advice.
The programme includes footage of Paul Kenyon confronting a trainer with evidence of alleged race fixing.
However, leading betting exchange Betfair.com claims that the bet which one trainer was alledged to have laid on his horse to win £1,600 at a race at Fakenham in March this year never took place.
Betfair says it can categorically state exactly whatbets have taken place in every race and on every outcome of every sportingevent since its launch in June 2000.
The Jockey Club and the BBC have already locked horns over a Panorama investigation into horse racing. Former security chief of theJockey Club, Roger Buffham, has an injunction preventing him from taking part in the programme, which will be screened this summer.
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