On the rails: Florida racing greyhounds test positive for cocaine
Trainer suspended as 12 dogs test positive for drug
At least 12 greyhound racing dogs in Florida have tested positive for cocaine, and their trainer has had his license suspended.
It’s at least the second instance this year of racing greyhounds testing positive for cocaine. The dogs raced at Bestbet Orange Park in northeast Florida near Jacksonville. The state is home to 12 of the 19 dog tracks in the US, where 40 states have outlawed the sport.
Although supporters say the dogs are treated well, the industry faces intense scrutiny. Records show Florida’s greyhound industry has had 62 cocaine positives since 2008.
In the Jacksonville area case, first reported by WTLV-TV, the dogs tested positive in March and April for benzoylecgonine, a metabolite of cocaine, according to documents from the state Department of Business and Professional Regulation. The documents are dated June 9 and say that trainer Charles McClellan “is a threat to animals in his control, custody and care.”
Carey Theil, executive director of GREY2K USA in Boston, a track monitoring group that opposes greyhound racing, called the most recent cased “breathtaking” because of the number of dogs that tested positive.
Regulators don’t typically investigate how the dogs got cocaine in their systems, and it’s unclear in the latest case how that happened. But Theil said the most likely scenarios are someone trying to fix races, or the trainer using the drug and the dogs coming in contact by accident.
