SATATOGA SRINGS – Veterinarian Dr. Michael Galvin plans a legal challenge to the $15,000 fine and 45-day suspension, set to begin Wednesday, imposed by the N.Y. State Racing and Wagering Board for improper record keeping, according to his attorney Karen Murphy.
The board’s penalty stems from an incident in March 1998, when Galvin was accused by a SRWB investigator of “tubing” (illegally treating) the filly Hip Wolf on race day. The New York Racing Association suspended Galvin for several months in the summer of ’98 until a federal judge ordered him reinstated, then spent a year trying to ban the vet until the case was finally settled out of court.
The SRWB, however, imposed its own 60-day suspension in November ’98, reducing that to 45 days after a final hearing Wednesday. Galvin, represented before the board by attorney Kevin Plunkett, was willing to accept a 30-day suspension, requesting it be served after the Breeders’ Cup.
“(SRWB) Chairman (Michael) Hoblock felt quite insulted by that,” said Stacey Walker, the board’s public information officer, who returned a call placed to the chairman. Walker also said the board felt NYRA’s case and its own were “two different issues.”
But Murphy, who represented Galvin throughout his battle with NYRA, believes the board’s stiff penalty was handed down not for the record-keeping but for the alleged tubing.
“They didn’t prove it, they can’t prove it, and they still punish him for it,” she said. “We researched 25 years of decisions regarding record-keeping violations, hundreds of them, and not one ever imposed a suspension. No jurisdiction regards it to be a significant violation. What is always done for a first-time offender is a fine of $100.
“It’s shocking to me that a state official (Hoblock) who had all the opportunity to prove his case and didn’t is demanding two years later an admission of guilt from an innocent party.”
Murphy said Plunkett represented Galvin before the board, rather than herself, because “Hoblock required I be removed from the case, that he would not deal with negotiations if I was involved.
“The charade is over. He did not engage in good-faith negotiations, and we’re going to court to seek a stay.”
