By T. D. Thornton
A federal judge on Thursday granted Bob Baffert the expedited preliminary injunction hearing the trainer is seeking in his fight to overturn a private-property ban by Churchill Downs, Inc. (CDI). But getting that hearing on the docket is only one step in a complicated, deadline-driven legal process in the Hall-of-Famer's long-shot quest to try to be able to saddle horses in the GI Kentucky Derby.
The just-assigned Apr. 15 date for the hearing in United States District Court (Western District of Kentucky, LouisvilleDivision) will come 22 days before the Derby.
But even if the federal judge ends up issuing an order that lifts CDI's two-year ban of Baffert over his repeated equine medication violations while that case gets heard in full, Baffert still faces a separate–and steep–legal hurdle in the form of an under-appeal 90-day suspension imposed by the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission (KHRC) because of a betamethasone positive in Medina Spirit, his now-deceased 2021 Derby winner.
Baffert is separately fighting that commission-level suspension in the Kentucky Court system, and Mar. 31 brought yet another technical twist to an already confusing plot.
The KHRC's Thursday filing in Kentucky's Court of Appeals was a motion to dismiss Baffert's appeal of a Franklin Circuit Court decision not to grant the trainer a stay or temporary injunction that would have kept the suspension and a $7,500 fine from going into effect while the KHRC's own appeals process plays out.
Here's a boiled-down sequence of what's transpired over the past six weeks in the KHRC case:
On Feb. 21, the KHRC issued Medina Spirit's dirty-test rulings against Baffert (the suspension and fine) and owner Amr Zedan (a DQ from the Derby and loss of purse winnings). Baffert and Zedan then appealed at the commission level; the appeal was granted, but on Feb. 25 a request for a stay of the penalties while the appeal played out was denied by the KHRC's executive director, Marc Guilfoil. So Baffert and Zedan took the matter to the Franklin court Feb. 28.
On Mar. 2, the Franklin judge said he would hold off on a full court hearing to decide the stay and/or injunction until after the full KHRC board had a chance to vote on the stay instead of just relying on the executive director's say-so.
On Mar. 4, the KHRC board voted 10-0 Mar. 4 to deny the stays of penalties in accordance with the decision Guilfoil had already made. Franklin Circuit Court then took up the hearing Mar. 17.
Then on Mar. 21, the Franklin judge denied the request to force the KHRC to impose any sort of stay, writing in an order that “A temporary injunction is an extraordinary remedy” that the court would not grant.
Baffert and Zedan then decided to kick the Franklin court's denial up to the higher Court of Appeals on Mar. 24.
Then, one day later, the Court of Appeals judge raised the issue of whether the underlying Franklin Court appeal originated in the correct venue in the first place. The question that judge wants answered drills down to whether or not the initial appeal of the KHRC's denial of a stay should have been heard in Jefferson County (where the Derby itself is run), Fayette County (where the KHRC's offices are headquartered), or Franklin County (where the Kentucky Public Protection Cabinet, the KHRC's parent organization, is housed).
Now, the Mar. 31 KHRC motion to dismiss asks another layer to the case by asserting that Baffert and Zedan's “failure to follow the proper procedures set forth in [state law] divested Franklin Circuit Court of jurisdiction over their appeal.”
In plain language, the “subject-matter jurisdiction” technicalitythat the KHRC raises has to do with the timing of when Baffert and Zedan filed their Franklin County appeal: It was after Guilfoil issued his no-stay determination via letter, but before the full KHRC board had voted to deny the stay. Failing to amend their filing to reflect that distinction makes Baffert and Zedan's complaint “defective,” the KHRC is arguing.
“A defective Complaint can cause a case to be dismissed for lack of subject matter jurisdiction,” the KHRC's motion to dismiss states.
“Movants' failure is more than form over substance,” the motion to dismiss states. “Movants have failed to properly place into the record the steps that are required by [state law]. Even their request for injunctive relief fails to mention the Commission's Final Order.”
Baffert's court fights are taking place against the backdrop of contingency plans that have involved transferring his Derby contenders to other trainers. This will allow those horses to try and earn qualifying points and enter the Derby in the event Baffert can't get judges to overturn both the CDI ban and also impose a stay on his KHRC suspension in time for the May 7 first leg of the Triple Crown.
Not a subscriber? Click here to sign up for the daily PDF or alerts.
