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Victor Conte, who masterminded a plan to distribute stealthy performance-enhancing drugs to professional athletes such as baseball greats Giambi and Bonds and track and field star Jones in the past, has passed away. He reached 75 years.

Official Inquiry and Criminal Cases

The federal government's inquiry regarding a separate firm Conte founded, Balco, resulted in the convictions of Marion Jones, elite sprint cyclist Tammy Thomas, and former NFL defensive lineman Dana Stubblefield, along with coaches, distributors, a trainer, a chemist and a lawyer.

Public Statements and Prison Time

The Balco founder, who spent four months in a federal facility for steroid distribution, discussed frankly about his high-profile athletes. He was featured on television to claim he had observed decorated Olympian Jones self-administer with growth hormones, but consistently avoided implicating Barry Bonds, the San Francisco Giants slugger.

Baseball's Investigation

This probe resulted in the volume Game of Shadows. Shortly after the publication date in 2006, baseball Commissioner Selig appointed former senate majority leader Mitchell to look into PED use.

He revealed he distributed steroids known as two specific substances and advised on their use to dozens of top performers, including Giambi, a star player, the Mitchell report said.

Using PEDs is a significant danger to the integrity of the game,” the findings emphasized. “Widespread use by players of these drugs puts at a disadvantage the those who refuse to cheat who decline to take them and leads to skepticism about the accuracy of historical stats.”

Mitchell indicated the problems didn’t develop overnight. The report emphasized each participant in baseball in the preceding decades – covering commissioners, team executives, the union and players – were partly accountable for what he termed the doping period.

Case Inception

The government's case into the laboratory was initiated by a revenue officer digging through the company’s trash. Conte eventually confessed to a couple of the 42 charges against him in 2005 prior to court proceedings. Half a dozen of the defendants sentenced were ensnared for misleading grand jurors.

Further Legal Actions

Bonds’ personal trainer Anderson, confessed to illegal substance sales linked to his Balco connections. The court gave him to a quarter year in incarceration and an equal period of restricted movement.

The Slugger's Case

The home run king was accused of deceiving a grand jury about receiving banned substances and went on trial in the early 2010s. The government abandoned his case four years later when the government decided not to appeal an overturned ruling to the federal apex court.

A decorated player and 14-time All-Star outfielder, Bonds ended his career after the 2007 season with a record home run tally, surpassing the record of 755 that Hank Aaron set from his career. He claimed he did not intentionally taking banned substances but has never been elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Conte's Post-Prison Life

The former convict stated in an interview in a 2010 interview that “competitors do cheat to triumph, but the federal representatives engage in misconduct as well.” He doubted whether the results in these trials justified the effort.

Following his prison term, Conte got back in business in 2007 by reviving a health products venture he had launched years before called SNAC System. He operated in the identical location that previously contained Balco in Burlingame, California.

Continued Justification

Conte remained defiant about his central role in doling out designer steroids to top sports stars. He argued he simply helped “even the competition” in a sports environment already rife with rule-breakers.

Outside Views

To a WADA member, a at the time a member of the World Anti-Doping Agency, Conte was essentially distributing illegal narcotics. “It concerns blatant drug dealing. It's about using drugs in defiance of legal codes,” the doctor remarked in that period. “It's not a good deed and this is not some do-gooding. This is drug dealing.”