Maurice Sercarz

Dr. Seth Fishman was not present in a Manhattan court in the final days of his trial involving his role in manufacturing and distributing performance-enhancing drugs, an absence that had gone unexplained for months. But a motion issued Friday by his attorney Maurice H. Sercarz seeking an adjournment of his sentencing answered the question. On February 2, 2022, when the jury returned its verdict convicting Fishman, he was an inpatient in the psychiatric wing at Mt. Sinai Hospital West. Fishman is scheduled to be sentenced Monday. Fishman was originally scheduled...

The veterinarian Seth Fishman--who is facing 20 years in prison, has an active motion asking for the first of his two convicted counts to be dismissed, and has already been granted one sentencing delay because he is allegedly having trouble filling out federal probation paperwork--again on Tuesday requested another delay of his sentencing. The half-redacted letter motion filed by his attorney in United States District Court (Southern District of New York) on May 17 suggests that a COVID-19 outbreak where he is being detained at Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn...

The veterinarian Seth Fishman, who is currently incarcerated at Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn after being convicted Feb. 2 on two felony counts in an international performance-enhancing drug (PED) racehorse doping conspiracy, had his lawyer ask a federal judge on Thursday to push back his May 5 sentencing because he is having trouble filling out required paperwork. Fishman is facing 20 years in prison, and he also has an active motion before the same judge asking for the first of his two convicted counts to be dismissed on the basis...

A New York jury began deliberations Feb. 1 in the horse doping trial of Dr. Seth Fishman. The jury of eight women and four men deliberated for about 30 minutes before retiring for the night without reaching a verdict. They resume deliberations the morning of Feb. 2. The charges against Fishman, a 50-year-old Florida veterinarian, stem from a federal government crackdown on horse doping at tracks across the country in which more than two dozen individuals were indicted. Those charged include top trainer Jason Servis, who is awaiting trial, and...

The jury in the federal horse-doping trial of Seth Fishman heard Jan. 25 a portion of a Federal Bureau of Investigation wiretap in which the veterinarian discusses whether the drugs he sold to horse trainers involved doping. "Any time you give something to a horse, that's doping," Fishman says in the conversation recorded by the FBI Apr. 5, 2019. "Whether or not they test for it is another story." On the call with Fishman was an unidentified individual who had wanted to know more about the drugs. "But it's not...

A New York jury heard a full day of testimony Jan. 21 in the horse doping trial of Dr. Seth Fishman and Lisa Giannelli. The entire morning and most of the afternoon featured a second day of testimony from a woman who worked for Fishman at his Florida business Equestology for five years. Courtney Adams, 34, testifying from Florida via video conference, told jurors that Fishman and Equestology were all about "testability." That meant creating "product" that couldn't be detected in post-race testing by horse racing authorities, she said. During...

A request by defendants Seth Fishman and Lisa Giannelli to delay next week's start of their trial in the alleged nationwide horse doping conspiracy because of COVID-19 concerns was not granted on Thursday by the judge handling the case. Although no specific court order answering the motion had been filed prior to deadline for this story, a summary entry on the court docket describing what happened at a Jan. 13 pre-trial conference contained the notation, "Trial to begin January 19, 2022," which is the originally scheduled start date. In two...

The legal team for Seth Fishman responded to allegations by federal prosecutors that the indicted Florida veterinarian is still selling purportedly performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) while awaiting trial in the international racehorse doping conspiracy case by telling the court Monday that the government "cannot meet its burden in demonstrating that the defendant's bail should be revoked." In a Dec. 13 filing in United States District Court (Southern District of New York), Fishman's attorney, Maurice Sercarz, wrote that the administrative assistant who permitted Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents to search Fishman's...

An employee of Florida veterinarian Seth Fishman last week permitted Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) agents to search her workplace, and the inside tip has allegedly yielded evidence that Fishman is still selling purportedly performance-enhancing drugs (PEDs) while awaiting an expected January start to his trail in the international racehorse doping conspiracy case. "Remarkably, despite having been arrested in October 2019 and indicted in 2020 in connection with his sale of misbranded and adulterated drugs designed to be 'untestable' by various antidoping authorities, Fishman apparently persists in touting the efficacy...