Sting That Ricocheted From Randwick To Happy Ending
Sydney Morning Herald
Friday March 23, 2001
To all apparent purposes the Sydney event the last race of the day had a deafening swish of oars with the whiff of stew. The winner had been backed as if unbeatable, and scored as the confidence indicated.
``Betting is the barometer to what happens in racing," according to Ray Murrihy, the NSW Thoroughbred Racing Board's chief stipe. ``Not as much as it used to but it's still there."
So Murrihy sent his betting steward, Terry Griffin, previously a bookmaker's clerk and ``form analyst", on the money trail in an effort to find the source of the sting.
To protect confidentiality, real figures won't be used.
Griffin, with the manner of a whiz-kid minus ego, discovered the original bet, say $100,000, had come from the owner of the winner. After having a bet in Sydney he passed on a fifth of the original to a ``commission agent". The agent, with the courage supplied by inside trading, added the same amount for himself.
Also, two Melbourne punters were given $40,000 each to place. They, too, put the same amount on for themselves.
But the action ricocheted.
According to Griffin it bounced to Darwin and Alice Springs (no mention of Vanuatu in official dispatches but I'd like to take evens plenty went there, too).
The Darwin bet snowballed with the bookmaker adding his own, and just before the horses were about to jump the money had rebounded back to Sydney bookmakers.
What had started with the owner having a typical bet, considerable as it was, the action had bounced around Australia and offshore, multiplying to double the original outlay.
``It started at Randwick and finished at Randwick," Murrihy said. ``We had some concerns about the race and the amount of money, but our investigations showed that agents and some bookmakers, instead of laying the bet, added to it [and flick-passed]. All the owner did was have his normal bet but the amount ended up doubling by the start of the race.
Unlike other money trails, it had a happy ending.
Obviously now there are very few areas in the betting world where the stewards can't pry.
Back in the good old days, owners and trainers would plead they had backed a horse with illegal starting price bookmakers. One well-known Melbourne trainer, Murrihy pointed out, maintained he got set for large amounts in Port Moresby. These days Vanuatu is the go, but there does seem to be some diplomatic immunity there for punters.
``Stewards were dismissive of SP evidence because it couldn't be proved," Murrihy explained. ``Another area was saying, `we had money with a string on it', bets appearing in [bookmaker's] sheets with insurance written all over them."
(Bookmakers would list a bet for an owner or trainer but no money would change hands. The bookmaker had the advantage, though, of knowing the horse wasn't expected to win.)
At times guilty parties would get desperate for a betting ticket indicating they had supported the horse under official review.
``In Tasmania I had a case where an owner appeared with five tickets and threw them on the table," recalled Murrihy, who had then asked the owner to elaborate about the bets.
``Can't you read a ticket?" the owner retorted.
But Murrihy was insistent the owner explain the price, the amount outlaid and time of the bet. Alas, after the third ticket he gave up and admitted to picking them up off the ground. The steward's decision? Banned for a year.
Another case history concerned a trainer who, even before the jockeys got back to scale, sent a mate out to get a betting ticket on his horse beaten in what must have been suspicious circumstances.
``He secured one for $200. The stewards questioned the bookmaker who had written the bet, and later his clerk identified the real punter, and it wasn't the trainer," Murrihy said.
Again more time for a trainer. Incidentally, the horse was called All Skill.
Which wasn't the case with a Brisbane trainer observed by Murrihy running to his car just before a race. After the event, in which his horse caught the steward's eye, the stipe recalled the trainer's haste.
``He gave evidence he ran to the car phone to have a bet," Murrihy said. ``The bets were traced and he took eight horses in multiples and didn't take his own, which was favourite."
Trainer, owner and jockey were not seen on a racecourse for a year.
Of course, when it came to commissions, ``Melbourne" Mick Bartley was legendary. In an era when communications were limited, Melbourne Mick launched plunges with anything from a red umbrella to a skyrocket.
Bartley was called before Australian Jockey Club stewards during the Ferd Calvin inquiry. The performance and amount of support for Count Mayo, owned by the high-profile Calvin, was questioned. The money trail located a $6,000 bet in Bartley's drawer.
``Your asking me about a $6,000 bet? I'd put that in a drawer and forget about it. Do you know what a $6,000 bet is? In my language it's toilet paper," Bartley said.
Later he divulged to the press that he wasn't boasting.
``I didn't mean I would throw money in the air when I made the crack about toilet paper, but those stewards were getting the message. I meant the $6,000 was nothing in comparison with my other operations ..."
© 2001 Sydney Morning Herald
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