A JOCKEY has been slapped with an 18-month ban after he did drugs in the toilet of a pub three days before a race.
This is the second time Flat rider Levi Williams has been banned for failing a test for the Class A drug.
Williams admitted taking cocaine on a ‘number of occasions’ on the evening of April 29 this year.
A BHA judicial panel heard that he also ‘consumed a quantity of alcohol such that he was intoxicated’.
It was made clear that Williams did not buy the cocaine but was ‘offered it by someone else’.
Williams was tested at Windsor racecourse and then rode the following day, May 2, at Wolverhampton.
It was there Williams picked up an 18-day improper riding ban and a seven-day whip suspension.
The jockey was previously banned for six months in 2021 after testing positive for cocaine and cannabis.
He was granted his licence back on the condition that he ‘practice continued asbtinence from all substances’.
He had originally moved away from Newmarket in a bid to ‘reduce his access to and temptation to indulge in substance abuse’.
Williams had also spent time at the Sporting Chance clinic set up by Arsenal legend Tony Adams.
However, because this was his second time being hauled before chiefs for cocaine use, the panel ruled a penalty of 18 months was sufficient.
The panel’s conclusion read: “The BHA submits that an appropriate period of withdrawal is a period of not less than six months starting from 31st May 2023.
“The panel concludes that in the circumstances it is fair and appropriate, reflecting both the severity of the penalty anticipated for a breach of rule (K)49 involving the use of cocaine, and the fact that Mr. Williams’ use of cocaine was in express breach of the terms of his licence, pursuant to rule (L)28, to declare that Mr. Williams is ineligible for a Licence, or other form of registration, under these Rules, for a period of 18 months to run from 31 May 2023 to 30 November 2024.”
