Canadian figure-skating judge Jean Senft, at the centre of a judging controversy in ice dancing, is totally frustrated. She doesn't know where to turn next.
Although she has spoken out during the past two years about the irregularities of dance judging -- the deal making, the gift giving and the predetermined results -- things seem to be moving backward.
She has withdrawn her appeal of a suspension for alleged "misconduct" at the Nagano Olympics, not because she's admitting guilt, but because the appeal would be a waste of time, she said yesterday.
Dropping the appeal means that her six-month suspension will now end on April 15, causing her to miss her assignment at the Four Continents Championships in Osaka, Japan.
Senft launched the appeal last fall to clear her name, but that is less important than trying to find a way to make the judging system fairer for athletes, she said.
"I don't need to clear my name. My integrity is intact. I know what happened. I just really want to work on solutions."
Senft waited for months for the appeal, which was to be heard on Monday during the European figure-skating championships in Vienna.
She was suspended for six months after she secretly taped a telephone conversation with Ukrainian judge Yuri Balkov, who was heard to rattle off the placements of skaters before the Olympic dance event was over. Balkov was suspended for one year, but Senft was surprised to find that she was set down, as well.
Senft feared the appeals panel in Vienna would not be impartial. It would have been made up of the same people who ruled against her on an earlier matter, and "there was a risk that their decision would be influenced by evidence heard at the earlier hearing," she said. "It was highly unlikely that they would overturn the ruling of the [International Skating Union]Council."
First, Senft was cited with national bias at the Nagano Olympics after speaking out about judging problems reported in The Globe and Mail in the fall of 1997. Eventually, the Court of Arbitration for Sport overturned the ISU ruling. The ISU suspended Senft for misconduct after she brought forward the Balkov tape at the Court of Arbitration hearing.
She expected that she would have to go before the Court of Arbitration again with her appeal. But all of these proceedings would be expensive and time consuming for both sides in the dispute, she said.
The ISU intends to introduce a number of proposals to change the judging of ice dancing at a congress next June in Quebec City. But Senft was horrified when informed of some of the recommendations.
One of the proposals creates three levels of judging, based on points earned at international competitions throughout the year: masters, gold and international.
The ISU suggests that two technical committee members watch each event and rank skaters according to groups. If a judge ranks a skater in the "correct" group, the judge gets a point. If a judge ranks a skater outside the predetermined group, the judge loses a point.
At the end of the season, the points are tallied. The 40 top-ranked judges would fit into the Masters group, the next 25-ranked judges would drop into the gold category and those who pass the routine ISU judges' test would be international-level judges. A world championship panel would be made up of judges from the three categories.
But a system by which judges are forced to guess in which predetermined groups to place skaters would only make judges fix placements for the wrong reasons, Senft said. "It's not going to encourage judges to call it as they see it. This is bizarre. I don't think it's the right way to go."
The current dance committee chairman is Russian Alexander Gorshkov, who was at the centre of a dance controversy last year in Helsinki. At the last minute, a Chinese judge changed his vote from a French dance team to the Russian team that eventually won.
The French federation protested against the change, because it felt Gorshkov, who left his seat as a referee of the event to stand over the judge, influenced him in favour of skaters from his own country.
Ironically, the protest had to be filed to the head of the dance committee, who was Gorshkov. Not surprisingly, he turned it down.
If Gorshkov were to act as a dance-committee representative, many skating insiders feel that he would be tempted to place Russians in the top group. Under this system, judges would be penalized for not placing Russian skaters in the top group. The proposal only opens the door for more judging abuses.
These proposals -- and others -- were revealed at a private meeting during the Lalique Trophy, a Grand Prix international event in Paris last fall. ISU president Ottavio Cinquanta barred media from attending the meeting. Senft, who did not judge at any Grand Prix events this year, did not attend the meeting.
Senft would prefer a body that was independent from the ISU or any national federation. It would be responsible for training judges and hiring and firing them, based on their competence and impartiality.
She enthusiastically supports the idea of banning all judges from a country if one of its members is engaged in misconduct. It's not a new idea. In 1978, the ISU suspended all judges from the former Soviet Union for a year after constant incidents of national bias.
Although the ISU introduced rule changes after the Nagano Olympics to force judges to look at specific elements on the ice, sources say deals are still made at international competitions this season.