Marcos Zulueta

A federal judge on Tuesday denied a request by prison-bound veterinarian Seth Fishman to dismiss Count One of his two racehorse doping conspiracy convictions. Fishman, whose 26 months as a defendant have been hallmarked by minor courtroom dramas, various attempts to prevent or delay the trial, and accusations that he continued to peddle purported performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) while free on bail, had argued that he was tried twice for the same crime because the first count was contained within the second, much broader conspiracy. Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil of United...

Thirty-four days after being found guilty by jury trial on two felony counts of conspiring to violate adulteration and misbranding laws in the nationwide racehorse doping case, the Florida-based veterinarian Seth Fishman made a motion in federal court asking for the first of those counts to be dismissed on the basis that it is allegedly "multiplicitous of" (already contained within) the second, much broader conspiracy. Fishman's Mar. 8 filing in United States District Court (Southern District of New York) is likely the first of several legal steps leading to a...

Marcos Zulueta, the former mid-Atlantic-based trainer with an abnormally high win percentage who was caught on wiretaps procuring drugs for and boasting about Thoroughbred performance-enhancing regimens with the convicted horse doper Jorge Navarro, was sentenced to 33 months in federal prison on Thursday. Zulueta, 53, had pleaded guilty in October to one felony count of adulterating and misbranding drugs with the intent to defraud or mislead. As part of a plea agreement, he had previously agreed to forfeit $47,525. At his Feb. 24 sentencing, the remaining two open felony charges...

The Jorge Navarro case was back in the news last week as lawyers representing the federal government submitted a sentencing letter regarding the disgraced trainer to Judge Mary Kay Vyskocil. They recommended that Navarro get the maximum allowable sentence for doping racehorses under his care, five years. He will be sentenced Friday. The government lawyers did their job and they did it well, and they want no mercy for the Juice Man. Read the sentencing letter and the first conclusion you will come to is probably the same one I...

Trainer Marcos Zulueta joined the growing list of those involved in the Jason Servis-Jorge Navarro doping scandal to change their plea to guilty. Zulueta did so Friday when appearing via teleconference before federal judge Mary Kay Vyskocil. In doing so, Zulueta became the ninth of 27 people indicted in March of 2020 to plead guilty. Having pleaded guilty to adulterating and misbranding drugs with the intent to defraud or mislead, he faces up to five years in prison and will be sentenced in February. In the original indictment, Zulueta was...

Marcos Zulueta, the now-barred Thoroughbred trainer facing two felony charges in the alleged nationwide horse-doping conspiracy case, appears on the verge of joining the growing list of defendants flipping their initial "not guilty" pleas to "guilty." On Thursday, Zulueta, formerly based in the mid-Atlantic region, was granted an Oct. 15 change-of-plea hearing in United States District Court (Southern District of New York). If Zulueta does indeed end up pleading guilty, his flip will be the eighth in the wide-ranging case that initially included 28 defendants listed in the original indictment...

The judge in the federal case against 14 alleged horse dopers on Friday granted a motion by the defense to extend the time frame to file motions to suppress evidence because of the massive amount of documentation that attorneys must sift through, which includes transcripts of potentially incriminating phone recordings, emails and text messages. "Given the volume of discovery that we are still reviewing, I respectfully request that the Phase Two Motions schedule be modified as follows: defense motions due June 28, government response due July 28, and defense replies...