Documents show Vet’s death panicked doping defendants

“The state police called me. They just found his body in the woods.”

“He is dead”

“Yup, I told you. They found his body in the woods and I guess she is going to be … I mean she gave us so many stories. That he was in rehab. He went there. He went there. She had to … they either had to kill him or did he actually get drunk and go out into the woods and dies. Who knows.”

So begins the transcript of a telephone call that’s one of the more sensational pieces of evidence divulged thus far in the ongoing federal doping cases. The transcript was attached to a government motion in November as part of the lesser-reported federal case of Louis Grasso, Donato Poliseno, Thomas Guido III, Richard Banca, and Rene Allard. That case is before a different judge than the monster indictment that includes high-profile Thoroughbred trainers Jorge Navarro and Jason Servis. The Servis et al case saw its first set of defendants go to trial last week, with veterinarian and drug maker Dr. Seth Fishman and sales associate Lisa Giannelli in court.

The Grasso case, which involves primarily harness racing connections, is still trading earlier-stage motions.

In response to one of those motions, prosecutors filed a series of legal arguments, and in one of them, felt the need to clarify the role of defendant Donato Poliseno in the alleged doping scheme. Poliseno, the prosecutors claim, was an animal drug dealer who created and distributed performance-enhancing substances for racehorses outside the regulation of the Food and Drug Administration. Attached to the prosecution’s motion was a batch of transcripts from intercepted phone calls between Poliseno and co-defendant Louis Grasso.

Grasso, while trained as a veterinarian, was not (according to the government) actively practicing, but rather focused on drug distribution and compounding.

The disclosed transcripts are all from phone calls between Poliseno and Grasso, who appeared to be in contact regularly in the fall of 2019. Over a series of calls, Poliseno grew increasingly worried about the death of a man in the woods in Delaware, who appears to have been veterinarian Dr. Edward Conner.

The disclosed transcripts are all from phone calls between Poliseno and Grasso, who appeared to be in contact regularly in the fall of 2019. Over a series of calls, Poliseno grew increasingly worried about the death of a man in the woods in Delaware, who appears to have been veterinarian Dr. Edward Conner.