Dank Associate Helped Players

by Lisa Albergo reporting for AFANA from Chicago

In the same week Stephen Dank revealed his involvement with the Melbourne Demons, his alleged associate Shane Charter was interviewed on another television show. Charter, a body builder, personal trainer and biochemist who runs an anti-aging clinic in Sydney, claimed he helped a number of NRL and AFL players use performance-enhancing drugs and escape detection by authorities. Charter is a convicted drug trafficker and was charged in 2004 with bringing millions of dollars worth of pseudoephedrine into Australia. Dank has denied having a connection with Charter from the beginning, but Charter alleges correspondence between the pair stretching back 18 months. Charter also claimed a biker affiliated contact introduced him to performance-enhancing drugs and organized crime in both Australia and Asia.

Part of the television interview is quoted below.

Question: "Just to be clear, you've assisted NRL players and AFL players with their use of performance-enhancing drugs?"

Charter: "I've kept them in a safe and non-toxic range so that they didn't do long-term damage to themselves."

Charter revealed that if athletes returned an unofficial positive test before "an event", that player would pull out, citing injury, to avoid in-competition testing, "If they (the test results) came back and they weren't passing the test, then depending on the product and the timeline up to the event, that athlete may pull a hamstring and not go to that event. " He justified the use of drugs by saying, "There's a difference between being shown positive and using performance-enhancing drugs, and that's the issue I'm trying to bring to light."

Charter has a long-standing relationship with James Hird and Essendon chairman David Evans, but is adamant that Hird had not use banned substances*. He apparently worked with Hird as a personal trainer during the twilight of the latter's career. Hird is not the only football player Charter has worked with. Melbourne newspaper, the Herald Sun, also revealed that Charter was an associate of the late underworld figure John Giannarelli, a sports agent who has represented athletes including Olympic swimmer Scott Miller and jockey Simon Marshall. Miller admitted supplying ecstasy to a rugby playing friend in 2008.

Neither Dank nor Charter have been interviewed by the AFL, WADA or ASADA

*Ed. note: During the mid-1990's, when he was still playing, James Hird once revealed that he was afraid to even take over-the-counter cold remedies for fear one might contain a miniscule amount of something that would result in a positive drug test by ASADA.

Source: heraldsun.com.au