21 premises searched as German doping probe continues

Mar 5, 2010, 15:08 GMT

Berlin - Investigators from Germany's Federal Crime Office (BKA) have searched 21 premises, including the house of speed skater Claudia Pechstein, as part of their ongoing investigation into doping.

As well as Pechstein's house in Brandenburg, which was searched Thursday, the German Speed Skating Association (DESG) branch office office in Munich was also visited by BKA officers.

The BKA also revealed that DESG members, athletes and a doctor's surgery were also under investigation.

The searches came about following charges brought last December by the DESG and Germany's National Anti-Doping Agency (NADA).

At the time, the DESG said it was bringing charges against unknown persons in an attempt to force an investigation into a possible violation of German law governing the manufacture and prescription of drugs.

'We have given the state investigators around 100 address,' DESG president Gerd Heinze said Friday.

'The charges and the subsequent investigation by state prosecutors doesn't mean that there have been breaches of medical prescription laws or anti-doping rules.'

Five-time speed skating gold medallist Pechstein received a two- year ban from the ruling skating body ISU in connection with a doping rule violation.

Pechstein was banned by the ISU for abnormally high levels of reticulocytes (immature red blood cells) in several blood tests.

She has always denied doping and never failed a drug test, with the ban a result of blood screening results for a biological passport.