Dr. Louis Grasso, a veterinarian, was sentenced to 50 months in prison by a federal court on November 15 and ordered to pay tens of millions of dollars in restitution related to the horse doping allegations against him. and more than two dozen others in early 2020.
Grasso is one of six people charged in the same indictment with racing-related doping offenses in the United States District Court for the Southern District of New York. On 11 May he pleaded guilty to a single alternative charge of distributing misbranded drugs to improve racehorse performance.
Downey: Grasso accepts plea in doping exploitation case
In addition to the more than four-year sentence, Judge P. Kevin Castel ordered Grasso to pay more than $47 million in restitution, sentenced him to two years of supervised release, and issued a forfeiture order for the money. is $412,442.
The government asked Castel to impose a sentence of 60 months in prison. Grasso requested 18 months of home confinement and permission to travel locally for medical care, citing a prolonged COVID illness, diabetes, lung and blood clotting disorders. Prosecutors argued that Grasso’s crimes went beyond those considerations.
“The defendant gave the trainers large quantities of his medication, allowing them to use the drugs as they pleased, meaning there was no supervision over the use, dosage, or duration of the drugs. as well as the medical necessity for the use of such potentially potent drugs,” the government wrote in a sentencing submission. “The defendant not only advertised his own line of prescription drugs, but also offered to prescribe counterfeit drugs to others, including the potent hematopoietic drug, Epogen, which Grasso had supplied to his accomplice Richard Banca, along with others.” the others.”
Grasso’s words piled up on his actions. In a series of arrogant messages revealed to Castel, the vet wrote that he was “ALWAYS the bad guy so that’s my reputation”; “I like it because it keeps the personality that I like!!!”; and that “all it does is make my business even bigger, people seem to like bad guys LOL LOL.”
According to online court records, Grasso was represented at the hearing by attorney Glenn Garber. Assistant U.S. Attorney Sarah Mortazavi appeared for the government, as she has done in many of this group’s cases, with the assistance of FBI special agent Naushaun Richards.
Castel ordered Grasso to arrange his business and surrender to rectification officials on January 23, 2023.
According to an earlier release from US Attorney Damian Williams, Grasso allegedly helped corrupt trainers collect more than $47 million in false winnings. That number matches the amount of compensation that Castel claims.
Co-defendant Rene Allard, a former coach, was sentenced by Castel on the same day as Grasso. Online court records were silent about his case when this story was posted.
