Lance Armstrong was facing two more lawsuits on Friday spawned by his admission that all seven of his Tour de France victories were fueled by banned drugs.
The Nebraska-based Acceptance Insurance Company sued Armstrong and Tailwind Sports Corporation, claiming he committed fraud by concealing his use of performance enhancing drugs during the 1999, 2000 and 2001 Tours.
“By his cheating and deception, Armstrong committed fraud. This suit seeks repayment of US$3 million in undeserved an unearned pay Lance Armstrong obtained by fraud,” the lawsuit filed in Travis County Court in Austin, Texas, said.
The payment cited was a US$3 million bonus paid to Armstrong for his first three Tour victories.
Acceptance claims that Armstrong’s lies void the policy under which the money was paid out.
In October, Armstrong was stripped of his Tour titles, as well as all other results from August 1998, and was banned for life after the US Anti-Doping Agency determined that he was the key figure in a sophisticated doping program on his US Postal Service team.
He finally made a belated admission of doping in a televised interview with Oprah Winfrey in January, in which he said he used a combination of blood-doping transfusions, blood-boosting EPO and testosterone throughout his career.
Armstrong was also sued on Thursday in federal court in Los Angeles in a class-action lawsuit claiming that Armstrong and FRS — maker of nutritional supplements — engaged in false advertising.
Armstrong spokesman Mark Fabiani said the Texan and his advisers had no comment on the suits, which are just the latest legal woes to spring from Armstrong’s disgrace.
The US government has joined a “whistleblower” lawsuit seeking to help the US Postal Service recoup “tens of millions” paid to Armstrong when it sponsored his team with more than US$30 million — a lawsuit that could deliver a triple-damages blow costing Armstrong more than US$90 million.
In Britain, he is being sued by the Sunday Times, which is seeking repayment of the £1 million (US$1.5 million) libel settlement that he won against the newspaper in 2006 after it printed allegations that he doped.
Revelations of positive doping tests for nearly two dozen Chinese swimmers that went unpunished sparked an intense flurry of accusations and legal threats between the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) and the head of the US drug-fighting organization, who has long been one of WADA’s fiercest critics. WADA on Saturday said it was turning to legal counsel to address a statement released by US Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) CEO Travis Tygart, who said WADA and anti-doping authorities in China swept positive tests “under the carpet by failing to fairly and evenly follow the global rules that apply to everyone else in the world.” The
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