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Victor Conte, who devised a operation to supply hard-to-detect banned substances to elite sports stars including MLB legends Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi and track and field star Jones decades ago, is deceased. He was 75.

Federal Investigation and Convictions

A national inquiry regarding an additional venture set up by him, the Bay Area lab, resulted in the convictions of Marion Jones, elite sprint cyclist Tammy Thomas, and former NFL defensive lineman Dana Stubblefield, along with various support personnel and professionals.

Public Statements and Sentencing

Conte, who completed a third of a year in federal prison for illegal drug sales, discussed frankly about his high-profile athletes. He was featured on broadcast media to assert he had witnessed decorated Olympian Marion Jones use a syringe with HGH, but never directly implicating Barry Bonds, the Giants power hitter.

The Mitchell Report

The federal case led to the publication titled Game of Shadows. A week after the book's publication in 2006, MLB commissioner Selig hired ex-senator George Mitchell to examine doping in baseball.

He admitted he distributed steroids known as certain undetectable drugs and guided their application to many elite athletes, like Jason Giambi, a five-time major league All-Star, the Mitchell report said.

“The illegal use of PEDs is a significant danger to the honesty of the competition,” the Mitchell report concluded. “Prevalent consumption by players of these compounds unfairly disadvantages the honest athletes who refuse to use them and creates doubts about the legitimacy of historical stats.”

It was stated the problems were not sudden. The report emphasized all parties in the sport in the preceding decades – including leaders, club officials, the union and athletes themselves – were partly accountable for what he termed the doping period.

Case Inception

The federal investigation into the company began with a tax agent digging through the company’s trash. Conte ended up pleading guilty to two of the numerous counts he faced in 2005 before a trial. Half a dozen of the 11 convicted people were caught deceiving grand jurors.

Associated Convictions

Bonds’ personal trainer Anderson, confessed to steroid distribution charges arising from his ties to the lab. The court gave him to 90 days in incarceration and an equal period of home confinement.

Bonds' Legal Battles

Bonds was indicted for providing false statements to a investigative body about obtaining banned substances and faced a trial in the early 2010s. The government abandoned the case down the line when the prosecutors opted not to appeal an overturned ruling to the supreme court.

A seven-time National League MVP and 14-time All-Star outfielder, he ended his career after the 2007 campaign with a record home run tally, exceeding the milestone of that number that Hank Aaron established from the 1950s to 1970s. He claimed he did not consciously consuming performance-enhancing drugs but has not been voted to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

After Incarceration

Conte told the Associated Press in a 2010 interview that “yes, athletes cheat to triumph, but the federal representatives engage in misconduct as well.” He wondered whether the outcomes in these trials merited the work.

Following his prison term, he got back in business in that year by rebooting a nutritional supplements business he had launched two decades earlier called his supplements brand. He set up shop in the very same place that once housed the original company in the California city.

Continued Justification

He remained defiant about his central role in providing custom PEDs to elite athletes. He maintained he simply helped “level the playing field” in a world full of rule-breakers.

Expert Opinions

To a WADA member, a then-member of the World Anti-Doping Agency, he could be compared to selling hard drugs. “It concerns totally illegal drug trafficking. It's about using drugs in breach of national statutes,” he stated in 2007. “It's not a good deed and it's not altruistic. It's illegal sales.”