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Victor Conte, who engineered a system to distribute hard-to-detect banned substances to top competitors such as baseball greats Giambi and Bonds and Olympic track champion Marion Jones decades ago, has died. He reached 75 years.

Official Inquiry and Criminal Cases

An official investigation into an additional venture Conte founded, the Bay Area lab, culminated in the criminal findings of Marion Jones, competitive biker Thomas, and retired NFL player Stubblefield, in addition to coaches, distributors, a trainer, a chemist and a lawyer.

Open Discussions and Prison Time

Conte, who spent a third of a year in federal prison for steroid distribution, spoke openly about his famous former clients. He was featured on TV to claim he had witnessed decorated Olympian Marion Jones self-administer with growth hormones, but never directly incriminating Barry Bonds, the Giants power hitter.

Baseball's Investigation

The investigation inspired the volume titled Game of Shadows. A week after the publication date in 2006, MLB commissioner Bud Selig brought on ex-senator Mitchell to examine doping in baseball.

Conte stated he provided steroids called certain undetectable drugs and guided their use to dozens of elite athletes, including Giambi, a five-time major league All-Star, according to the report.

Employing banned drugs poses a serious threat to the integrity of the sport,” the report stated. “Widespread use by players of these compounds unfairly disadvantages the clean players who decline to take them and creates doubts about the legitimacy of sporting achievements.”

The report noted the challenges didn’t develop overnight. Mitchell claimed all parties in professional baseball in the previous twenty years – encompassing commissioners, team executives, the union and athletes themselves – were partly accountable for what he termed the doping period.

Case Inception

The federal investigation into the laboratory started when a IRS investigator examining the business refuse. The defendant ended up pleading guilty to two of the 42 charges filed against him in 2005 prior to court proceedings. Six of the defendants sentenced were convicted for lying to grand jurors.

Further Legal Actions

His fitness instructor Greg Anderson, confessed to illegal substance sales stemming from his involvement with Balco. The court gave him to a quarter year in jail and the same duration of house arrest.

Bonds' Legal Battles

The home run king was indicted for lying to a investigative body about using banned substances and went on trial in the early 2010s. The case was dismissed the case after several years when the prosecutors opted not to appeal an reversed conviction to the supreme court.

A decorated player and frequent All-Star, Bonds concluded his playing days after the that season with 762 home runs, breaking the milestone of that number that Aaron established from 1954-76. Bonds denied consciously consuming PEDs but has failed to gain entry to the sport's hall of honor.

Conte's Post-Prison Life

He stated in an interview in a past conversation that “sportspeople break rules to triumph, but the federal representatives engage in misconduct as well.” He doubted whether the results in such proceedings merited the work.

After serving his sentence, Conte returned to work in that year by reviving a health products venture he had started years before called Scientific Nutrition for Advanced Conditioning or SNAC System. He set up shop in the identical location that previously contained Balco in Burlingame.

Defiant Stance

Conte continued to justify about his central role in providing custom PEDs to elite athletes. He maintained he simply helped “balance the odds” in a world full of cheaters.

Outside Views

To a WADA member, a then-member of the global anti-doping body, Conte was essentially pushing cocaine or heroin. “You are talking about unlawful substance distribution. This refers to drug consumption in breach of national statutes,” he stated in 2007. “This is not philanthropy and it's not altruistic. This is drug dealing.”