Updates about Jordan Chiles and the floor exercise bronze medal
Head arbitrator who ruled in favor of Romania in case that led to US gymnast Jordan Chiles losing Olympic bronze medal works for Romania. https://t.co/uA6ziOdYQf via @NYTimes
- tariq panja (@tariqpanja) August 13, 2024
Some highlights from the article:
The head of the CAS panel that ruled that Jordan Chiles had to give up her bronze medal, Hamad G. Gharavi, has represented the country of Romania for almost a decade in arbitration cases. He is currently serving as egal counsel to Romania in disputes at the World Bank’s International Centre for the Settlement of Investment Disputes. He won a case for Romania as recently as June.
According to CAS rules, panel members need to complete a conflict of interest form before each case that lists 3 probable outcomes. The first and third are explicit, revealing no conflict or a conflict so significant that they would require their recusing themselves from a case. The second is more nuanced, allowing arbitrators to reveal potential conflicts but giving them a chance to explain why the potential conflict should not prevent them from hearing a case. Mr. Gharavi disclosed his work with Romania in writing and none of the parties involved in the hearing objected to his appointment as the panel's chair.
However, an international arbitrator and one of the authors of the opinion piece that first disclosed Mr. Gharavi’s work for Romania, said that even if none of the parties objected, his work on behalf of Romania was significant and meant he would automatically have had to recuse himself under the IBA’s so-called red list of non-waivable activities.
USA gymnastics says that they are going to pursue “every possible avenue” for an appeal, including before the Swiss Federal Tribunal. That body, the only one that can hear an appeal against a decision by CAS, the sports court, only considers breaches of process and not new evidence related to the case itself. In 2021, the Swiss court ordered a new hearing for a Chinese swimmer accused of doping because the chair of the tribunal had made social media posts that indicated he might have an anti-Chinese bias.
The screw-ups continue in the Jordan Chiles case: I’m hearing that the Court of Arbitration for Sport did not reach out to the right US officials as CAS prepared for last week’s Romanian appeal in Paris. They are supposed to notify both sides and they got the wrong US officials.
- Christine Brennan (@cbrennansports) August 13, 2024
There's also this information posted by Christine Brennan, a USA Today columnist.
This is all really suspicious. How exactly did the CAS notify the wrong US officials? What parties were given a chance to object to the head panelist being on the case? Did that include the Romanian gymnastics officials? Was the US supposed to be one of those parties? I feel like the US would have objected to Mr. Gharavi being on the panel given his Romanian connections. This all definitely seems like there'd be a good case for the Swiss Federal Tribunal to request a new hearing.
Sources
https://twitter.com/tariqpanja/status/1823387364560982029
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/08/13/world/europe/olympics-jordan-chiles.html?unlocked_article_code=1.Ck4.Zjoj.xzy9RsuDzjus&smid=re-share
https://twitter.com/cbrennansports/status/1823178486112014812
Mods, sorry if things don't embed properly. It hasn't been working properly for me again for a few days.