Swiss Court Rejects Sun Yang’s Case To Remove CAS Judge

As the days roll on, more information concerning the overturning of the Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) ruling regarding Sun Yang‘s doping case is being revealed.

AP is reporting that a legal challenge by the multi-Olympic gold medalist against one of the CAS judges who originally banned Sun for 8 years has been rejected by a Swiss federal judge. This week, Switzerland’s supreme court said it deferred to CAS to decide if Romano Subiotto is eligible to serve on the judging panel at Sun’s retrial. (AP)

Subiotto was selected by the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) for Sun’s CAS trial once the organization’s original choice stepped aside during repeated challenges by Sun’s lawyer.

Subiotto represented one of three arbitrators on the CAS panel who handed down an 8-year suspension to Sun Yang. This was eventually overturned by the Swiss Federal Tribunal not on fact-based merits of the case, but due to the fact that CAS panel chairman, Franco Frattini, showed bias in the form of anti-China social media comments.

Subiotto and the other judge at the original hearing, Philippe Sands, a British barrister selected for the hearing by Sun’s legal team, could be picked for the retrial due next year. (AP)

WADA stated last week that the organization, “will take steps to present its case robustly again when the matter returns to the CAS panel, which will be chaired by a different president.”