World Athletics

Insider "systematic theft" of $1.75 million shakes World Athletics

Insider "systematic theft" of $1.75 million shakes World Athletics

Insiders at World Athletics are believed to have stolen about $1.75 million over “a period of several years,” prompting the federation to pursue criminal cases while launching “a set of enhanced internal financial controls,” it said in a statement.

The federation said it discovered the “systemic theft” earlier this year. The focus, it said in the statement, centers on two former employees and a contracted consultant. At issue: fake or doctored invoices.

One of the two ex-employees left before the theft was discovered. The other, and the consultant, “had their contracts terminated,” the federation said in that statement, offered in response to an inquiry about the matter.

Christian Coleman v. testers, part II: what is 'reasonable'?

Christian Coleman v. testers, part II: what is 'reasonable'?

The only reasonable conclusion to reach in the matter of the world’s anti-doping testers v. Christian Coleman, the world’s fastest man across 100 meters, is that the testers are seriously pissed off that Coleman got off the first time because they, the testers, didn’t understand their very own rules and now they’re targeting him.

Could, maybe should, Coleman have been more careful? That’s a reasonable question.

But let’s get this right out of the way. Coleman is one of the bright stars of the American track and field universe. Though the missed test took place last December 9, this controversy is erupting now. To try to take Coleman out now — amid the national, indeed international, furor tied to the grief and anger that generations of black Americans have suffered at the hands of institutional systems that are unfair because they or, worse, the people in charge of them, are not reasonable — will not prove constructive. Not at all.

Indeed, this case underscores a lot of what’s fraught about the anti-doping control system.