Licenses and permits – Horse – Drug test – Trainer

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Where the defendant State Racing Commission suspended a plaintiff's horse-trainer's license for 10 days after a urine sample taken from a horse trained by the plaintiff tested positive for cocaine, the suspension was not based upon substantial evidence and therefore must be vacated.

"Rather than address the issue of the unscientific opinion testimony underlying its original decision as directed by the remand order, the Commission took an entirely different tack. It focused on supposed defects in the merits of the plaintiff's expert testimony. It concluded that plaintiff had the burden to prove that the cocaine did not enter the horse's system and that her expert testimony fell short in proving this fact. The Commission did not explain why it rejected the generally accepted scientific principle related to metabolites which itself is substantial evidence that the cocaine did not enter the horse's body. … This new focus on supposed defects in the plaintiff's proof is tantamount to moving the goal post. It is, in my judgment, nothing more than a legal

sleight of hand to justify the same result.

"Even assuming that plaintiff bears the burden of proof that the cocaine did not enter the horse's body, she met that burden because her evidence was scientifically validated and undisputed. The Commission accepted plaintiff's proffer that if cocaine enters the body, it inevitably metabolizes. … Plaintiff's expert's testimony based on established scientific principles that cocaine could not have entered the body without being metabolized was sufficient, especially after the Commission abandoned its reliance on its expert's ‘theoretically possible' statements in its remand decision. Plaintiff's evidence was such as might he accepted by a reasonable person as adequate and there was no rebuttal by the Commission's expert. The Commission's remand decision rejecting the plaintiff's evidence without any credible contrary opinion is not based on substantial evidence and cannot stand."

Meade v. State Racing Commission (Lawyers Weekly No. 12-077-10) (8 pages) (Hines, J.) (Suffolk Superior Court) Harris Krinsky for the plaintiff; Sookyoung Shin for the defendant (Civil No. 08-4136-B) (Feb. 5, 2010).