Disgraced Pyleva gets two-year ban in Torino
TORINO, Italy (Reuters) -- Russian biathlete Olga Pyleva was banned for two years and will be grilled by Italian magistrates after failing a drugs test at the Winter Olympics.
Pyleva tested positive for a banned stimulant following her silver medal in the women's 15-km individual event.
The punishment was handed out after an International Biathlon Union hearing on Friday where Pyleva pleaded her innocence and said the positive test was a "horrible mistake."
As she emerged from the hearing, the Russian was visibly stunned when told by reporters that she would be questioned by Italian magistrates. Doping is a criminal offence in Italy.
"What? There is a case against me?," Pyleva said, adding this was going to be her last Games and did not want to end her career this way.
Asked whether she thought she would be convicted, Pyleva said: "I hope not. I really hope it won't happen.
"I hope they believe me. I have always been open. I have spoken only the truth," she said.
Pyleva was stripped of her accreditation and was forced out of the Olympic village. She said she would remain in Italy for the time being and did not yet know when she would leave.
Her private doctor, Nina Vinogradova, blamed the Russian pharmaceutical company saying she had prescribed the right medicine which was approved by the drug's manufacturer.
"It's a new medicine but it had all the necessary certificates," Vinogradova told a news conference in the Siberian city of Krasnoyarsk.
But Russia's biathlon chief shifted the blame on the doctor.
"She (Pyleva) never told us that she took some medicine which was prescribed by her private doctor," Alexander Tikhonov said in televised comments. "The doctor just made a mistake in prescribing the wrong medicine."
A gold medallist in the 10-km pursuit at the 2002 Salt Lake City Games, Pyleva tested positive for carphedon, a prohibited stimulant, on Feb. 13 after the women's 15-km individual biathlon.
Russian media on Friday pointed a finger at Leonid Tyagachyov, president of the Russian Olympic Committee.
The Sovietsky Sport newspaper said Tyagachyov had publicly promised no repeat of a huge doping scandal that rocked Russia at the Salt Lake City Olympics four years ago.
"Yesterday's Olga Pyleva drama proved that Russian sports officials are simply not capable of learning lessons from previous doping scandals. And from their mistakes as well," it said.
