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Victor Conte, who devised a plan to distribute hard-to-detect performance-enhancing drugs to elite sports stars featuring baseball greats Giambi and Bonds and Olympic track champion Marion Jones in the past, has passed away. His age was 75.

Government Probe and Criminal Cases

An official probe of another company established by Conte, the Bay Area lab, culminated in the criminal findings of Marion Jones, elite sprint cyclist Tammy Thomas, and former NFL defensive lineman Dana Stubblefield, in addition to coaches, distributors, a trainer, a chemist and a lawyer.

Open Discussions and Legal Consequences

The Balco founder, who spent several months in a federal facility for dealing steroids, discussed frankly about his famous former clients. He appeared on TV to claim he had observed three-time Olympic medalist Jones use a syringe with HGH, but never directly pointing the finger at Barry Bonds, the Giants power hitter.

The Mitchell Report

The investigation resulted in the publication titled Game of Shadows. Just days following the publication date in the mid-2000s, MLB commissioner Bud Selig brought on political figure Mitchell to investigate steroids.

He revealed he distributed steroids known as certain undetectable drugs and guided their use to dozens of elite athletes, such as Giambi, a star player, the Mitchell report said.

Using PEDs poses a serious threat to the integrity of the competition,” the Mitchell report concluded. “Prevalent consumption by athletes of these drugs puts at a disadvantage the clean players who refuse to use them and raises questions about the accuracy of historical stats.”

The report noted the issues were not sudden. Mitchell claimed each participant in baseball in the preceding decades – including leaders, management, the players’ association and athletes themselves – bore partial blame for what he called the PED epoch.

Investigation Origins

The government's case into the laboratory started when a IRS investigator searching the company’s trash. He ultimately admitted guilt to a pair of the numerous counts against him in 2005 before a trial. Six of the individuals found guilty were caught deceiving the court.

Further Legal Actions

Bonds’ personal trainer Greg Anderson, confessed to illegal substance sales arising from his involvement with Balco. Anderson was sentenced to a quarter year in jail and the same duration of house arrest.

His Court Proceedings

The home run king was accused of lying to a investigative body about using PEDs and faced a trial in that year. The government abandoned the case four years later when the government decided not to appeal an overturned ruling to the supreme court.

A seven-time National League MVP and star performer, he ended his career after the that season with a record home run tally, exceeding the record of Aaron's total that Hank Aaron achieved from his career. Bonds denied knowingly using banned substances but has never been elected to the Hall of Fame.

After Incarceration

He stated in an interview in a past conversation that “sportspeople break rules to succeed, but the government agents and prosecutors cheat to win, too.” He wondered whether the outcomes in such legal cases were worth the resources.

Following his prison term, he returned to work in 2007 by rebooting a nutritional supplements business he had started years before called his supplements brand. He located it in the same building that was home to his former lab in Burlingame.

Unapologetic Views

He continued to justify about his central role in providing custom PEDs to elite athletes. He argued he simply helped “even the competition” in a world teeming with doping athletes.

Outside Views

To an expert, a at the time a member of the global anti-doping body, Conte could be compared to pushing illegal narcotics. “You are talking about unlawful substance distribution. It's about drug consumption in violation of federal law,” he stated in the past. “This isn't charity and this is not some do-gooding. It's trafficking.”