Chemist Patrick Arnold caught up in BALCO Steroid Scandal
By George Spellwin,
EliteFitnessRespected Chemist and Elite Fitness.com Platinum Member Patrick Arnold Could Become the Latest Victim in the BALCO Steroid Scandal! 
By now you’ve no doubt seen and heard numerous stories and reports on the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO) steroid “scandal” that was exposed in 2004. In fact, you’d have to be from another planet not to have heard anything with the high profile sports names that were implicated in the case. Some of baseball’s biggest stars such as Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi, boxer “Sugar” Shane Mosely, as well as one of the greatest track and field athletes of all time, Marion Jones, were just a few of the athletes mentioned in the investigation of the BALCO Corporation. Their names were dragged through the mud in the case alleging that BALCO supplied steroids and other performance enhancing substances banned by professional sports to its clients.
BALCO’s founder and president, Victor Conte Jr., has not been immune to the circus either as he received the largest punishment administered to anybody involved with the case so far. He received a four month prison sentence followed by four more months of house arrest for his role in directing a plan to provide athletes with undetectable banned substances. Now, another name can now be added to the witch hunt as Champaign, Illinois chemist and EliteFitness.com Platinum Member Patrick Arnold has been indicted on three counts by a U.S. grand jury in San Francisco, California.
The indictment came after an investigation by both the IRS ─ Criminal Investigation unit and the Food and Drug Administration ─ Office of Criminal Investigation. According to the indictment, Patrick Arnold attempted to hide his activities by sending drugs to Victor Conte that were designed to be undetectable by sports governing bodies such as the National Football League and Major League Baseball. He also supposedly sent THG to a Greek track coach, wired money to individuals in China, and sent more THG packages to Conte in San Mateo, California.
The charges facing Patrick Arnold include conspiracy to distribute anabolic steroids, conspiracy to defraud consumers in the United States by introducing misbranded drugs into interstate commerce, and the introduction of a misbranded drug called tetrahydragestrinone, a.k.a. THG and “The Clear”, into interstate commerce. To sum up these charges, basically various government agencies have deemed that Arnold schemed with Victor Conte to distribute banned substances to athletes that were mislabeled and didn’t contain proper warnings.
When hearing of the counts against Patrick Arnold through the legal language of the courts, the use of words such as “conspiracy” and “defraud consumers” would lead the public to believe that Mr. Arnold is an immoral cheat whose goal was to get rich by selling illegal drugs. However, an education of Arnold’s background would quickly dispel these thoughts and show him for the brilliant chemist that he is.
Patrick Arnold’s education began at the University of New Haven which culminated in him receiving a B.A. in chemistry in 1990. He continued to further his education by doing graduate work at the University of Connecticut and Montclair St. University. But he quit his Ph.D. studies early in order to open LPJ Research Inc., an Illinois-based company that manufactures dietary supplement ingredients and prohormone products. Patrick still remains president of LPJ Research Inc. to this day.
Mr. Arnold’s accomplishments and precedents are astounding and have made him an icon in the supplement and performance enhancing substance communities. He has introduced multiple supplements to the market such as choline, ipriflavone, chrysin, and lysophosphidyl. He is considered to be one of the world’s foremost experts in male hormonal enhancement and muscle development and he has been labeled the “father of prohormones”. This is perhaps where his most notable accomplishment lies as he was responsible for the introduction of the prohomrone androstenedione, better known as “andro”, into the mainstream. Andro gained much fame and notoriety, when former Major League Baseball player Mark McGuire admitted that he took the testosterone aiding substance to fuel his single season home run record breaking year in 1998.
Aside from all of the supplements and performance enhancers that Arnold has introduced, he has also been an active educational author of numerous articles for the muscle building industry. Numerous articles of his have appeared in major magazines such as ESPN magazine and Muscle and Fitness. Posting as Platinum Member “pa1ad”, he has over 700 posts on EliteFitness.com. As a longtime Platinum Member, he frequently responds to questions about performance enhancement, cycling, and more recently on the prohormone 1-AD (a muscle builder that Patrick rediscovered). The down to earth and informative answers that he provides have made him very popular among web users seeking answers for their concerns.
Arnold’s activities don’t entirely revolve around developing performance enhancers and writing about muscle building; he is also deeply involved in the political aspect of the industry. He co-founded a non-profit organization for people who are interested in preserving safe sports supplements and other nutritional products called the United Supplement Freedom Association. This group works with scientists, political lobbyists, legislators, and physicians to develop guidelines for the production, distribution, and marketing of different nutritional supplements. Patrick is also the president of the Prohormone Research Organization, which is a lobby group that was assembled with the purpose of providing legislators and government officials with factual scientific information about prohormones and other dietary supplements.
With everything that Arnold has done for the performance enhancing substance and nutritional supplement industries, it is hard to imagine that he is the same man that wanted to “defraud consumers” and it is difficult to picture him as the villain that the government has been making him out to be lately.
The words of U.S. Attorney Kevin V. Ryan made it sound as if a lethal drug lord had been taken down. Ryan said, “Today, we have taken another important step in the ongoing effort to eliminate the use of illegal performance enhancing drugs in sports. As evidenced by today’s indictment of Mr. Arnold, who allegedly conspired to distribute anabolic steroids and misbrand drugs with the intention to defraud, we remain steadfast in our commitment to prosecuting those individuals involved in the distribution of anabolic steroids and performance enhancing drugs.”
More and more, it seems that Patrick Arnold may become yet another victim of the federal government’s renewed vendetta against those involved with substances banned by pro sports and anabolic steroids. Politicians have used the issue of a need for stricter substance abuse policies in pro sports and criminalization laws for those distributing steroids as an avenue to more publicity. No one has benefited more from this than Senator John McCain, who has used every opportunity he can to make television and news conference appearances in order to preach about cleaning up pro sports.
John McCain has used his chairman of the Senate Commerce Committee position and knowledge of athletics to influence members of the federal government to take action against professional sports that will not bend to the will of congress and adopt tougher substance abuse policies. He worked feverishly to shed light on the BALCO situation and deliver Department of Justice documents from the investigation to the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency. McCain is also trying to clean up sports that are plagued by corruption such as boxing. While trying to improve the marred ranking systems of boxing is an honorable action, the question must be asked: has he gone too far in trying to control pro sports drug policies and criminalize steroid crimes.
The Arizona senator was a key figure in pushing President Bush towards signing the Anabolic Steroid Control Act of 2004. The law makes possession of prohormone tablets such as andro a federal crime punishable by up to one year in jail and the distribution of such substances a felony punishable by up to five years in prison for first time offenders.
If convicted, Patrick Arnold’s fate may not stray far from these punishments. The maximum penalty for both the counts of conspiracy to distribute anabolic steroids and conspiracy to defraud consumers in the United States by introducing misbranded drugs into interstate commerce is five years in prison and a $250,000 fine. The max penalty for the count of introducing misbranded drugs into interstate commerce is three years in prison and a $250,000 fine.
Based on a forum posting by Arnold, he knew the federal government was out to get him but thought that he would escape connections with the BALCO case. His posting read, “I have learned the only real crime in selling one of these compounds is a minor FDA violation…really as much as the feds may want to make an example of me, with the way the law is written there is not much that can be done. Certainly they may make a media and political controversy out of it. But I don’t care.”
Unfortunately, if a jury can be sold on the idea that the substances that Patrick Arnold developed were in fact synthesized steroids instead of steroid precursors, then he may be mistaken about the prospective punishment he might be facing if he were to be convicted. Furthermore, the authorities were able to use postings such as these as evidence against him in the indictment. The 2002 U.S. Olympic bobsledder Gea Johnson, who claims that she was a friend of Arnold’s for two to three years, confirmed his identity on the forums on the website Bodybuilding.com. She also confirmed posting in which Arnold boasted that he had synthesized steroids since 1991 (some friend).
Mr. Arnold’s lawyer, my friend Rick Collins, asserts that Arnold is innocent. Another of his lawyers, Nanci Clarence, said in a statement, “Patrick Arnold is a respected chemist and researcher in the field of nutritional supplements. He is not guilty and will defend these charges vigorously in a court of law, not in the press. He looks forward to his day in court.”
Looking at Patrick Arnold’s background, Nanci Clarence may have even understated his importance to the field of nutritional supplements. Let’s hope for the industries of performance enhancing substances and nutritional supplements that he can prove his innocence and continue his brilliant career.
