Court of Arbitration for Sport Overturns Ban on 28 Russian Athletes (February 1, 2018) [1]
On February 1, 2018, the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) overturned [3] the International Olympic Committee’s (IOC) suspension for twenty-eight Russian athletes and partially upheld appeals for eleven other Russian athletes. In the wake of the 2014 Olympic Winter Games, the IOC found that forty-three Russian athletes had committed anti-doping rule violations during the games, and they were subsequently disqualified, their medals were declared forfeit, and they were determined to be ineligible to participate in all subsequent Olympic Games. All but one appealed the decision to the CAS, which found that for twenty-eight of those athletes, “the evidence collected was found to be insufficient to establish that an anti-doping rule violation (ADRV)” and that “the appeals are upheld, the sanctions annulled and their individual results achieved in Sochi 2014 are reinstated.” For eleven other athletes, “the evidence collected was found to be sufficient to establish an individual ADRV,” but they were declared ineligible for only the next Olympic Winter Games in Pyeongchang, 2018, instead of the original lifetime ban. The CAS noted that its aim was not to determine whether there had been an organized scheme regarding doping in the Sochi lab, and that the cases for each athlete were decided individually.