Dateline: 28th August, 2009 - FEI Headquarters, Switzerland

Irish show jumping hero Eddie Macken has been fined 1,500CHF, and the €34,000 prizemoney earned by the Irish team for finishing second in last year's Aga Khan Cup at Dublin Horse Show must be refunded following a decision published by the legal arm of the FEI yesterday.

Macken has been disqualified from the competition, and because only two other team members completed the class on the day Ireland does not have the three results required to formulate a full result so the team is also disqualified.

The FEI Tribunal said that the Canadian-based Longford man had committed only "a minor technical violation resulting from....negligence" when his horse was not subjected to medication control testing at last year's premier show jumping event.

The Tribunal was highly critical of the "ineffectiveness of officials" because they had not "strictly observed the rules" in allowing him to compete and failed to ensure the horse underwent the appropriate testing procedures.

Macken frankly admitted on arrival at the RDS last August that his mare, Tedechine Sept, had been treated for an attack of colic two days earlier but a "special arrangement" was put in place which permitted him to ride provided the horse was tested before the end of the show.

That agreement also stipulated that the horse should not be removed from the showgrounds without authorisation from the International Ground Jury headed by Ireland's Ronan Sugrue.

Officials contended that they attempted to locate the horse on the final day of the show in order to do the test but that it could not be found. Macken insisted his horse was "walked within the grounds" and only left the show at the end of the event while his groom, Melissa Gaulton, testified that Tedechine was present until 7pm on the final night.

In summing up the Tribunal said it "could not establish that the PR (Macken) evaded same collection as "evading sample collection contemplates intentional conduct....the evidence does not support any such evasive conduct....".