Third witness also ‘injected’ Ben Johnson

Press, 18 March 1989, Page 96

Third witness also ‘injected’ Ben Johnson

NZPA-Reuter

Toronto

A third witness in the Canadian government inquiry on drug use in amateur sport said yesterday that he had injected disgraced Olympian Ben Johnson with banned anabolic steroids in 1984 and 1985.

A former sprinter, Tony Issajenko, told the inquiry he injected Johnson with steroids on several occasions at team training camps in Guadeloupe and Florida. “I had no doubt he (Johnson) knew what he was getting was steroids. He understood. Ben even made jokes on the effects of steroids on one’s libido,” he testified. The inquiry was ordered after Johnson was stripped of his Olympic 100-metre gold medal in Seoul when he tested positive for the steroid stanozolol.

Earlier at the inquiry, Tony Issajenko’s wife, Angella Issajenko, and their coach, Charlie Francis, said they had also injected Johnson with steroids. Francis testified that Johnson began using banned drugs in 1981. Angella Issajenko, Canada’s top female sprinter for a decade, concluded nearly four days of testimony earlier yesterday after detailing her own

steroids use since 1979. The 30-year-old sprinter said she and Johnson were injected with a steroid which their doctor Mario (Jamie) Astaphan said was estrogol as late as three weeks before the Olympics in September. Issajenko said, however, she believed the injections were not estrogol, but were Winstrol-V — the brand name for a form of stanozolol used for veterinary purposes, particularly on race horses. Issajenko said she had intentionally taken Winstrol — but not Winstrol-V — before, but only in tablet form and not after 1985 because it made her muscles stiff. Francis said he believed Johnson had not taken Winstrol, also known as stanozolol, in any form since April 1987, and was therefore puzzled when it was found in Johnson’s Olympic urine test.

The commission chairman, Justice Charles Dubin, asked Issajenko when

she began to suspect tne estrogol was some other steroid. “I received the same muscle stiffness with the estrogol (in 1987 and in September 1988) as I did when I took Winstrol (in 1985),” she said.

"Around 1987 I arrived at the conclusion that it (estrogol) was probably Winstrol-V.

Issajenko was not asked why she continued taking the injections. Astaphan’s lawyer, Lome Levine, told reporters he was surprised at Issajenko’s testimony.

“I don’t think it’s a possibility at all (that Astaphan gave them stanozolol instead of estrogol). Why would he do that?” Levine said.

Astaphan will be called to testify at a later date. The inquiry adjourned until April 3 when it will hear from other athletes who were team-mates of Johnson. Johnson is not expected to testify until May at the earliest.