The Court of Arbitration for Sport (Cas) has hit back at “outrageous” claims of bias surrounding its handling of the Jordan Chiles case that saw the American stripped of her Olympic bronze medal.
Cas upheld an appeal from the Romanian Olympic Committee last week that argued that an enquiry placed by the United States during the women’s floor final had been submitted too late.
The removal of the extra 0.1 of a point gained after the enquiry dropped Chiles’ score below that of Romania’s Ana Barbosu, and the International Gymnastics Federation (Fig) upgraded Barbosu from fourth to third.
USA Gymnastics subsequently challenged Cas’ ruling, citing new video evidence that it claimed showed the enquiry was placed within the one-minute time limit, but the court ruled that it could not re-consider the matter.
Subsequent reports in the United States suggested that the chairman of the Cas panel making the judgement had links to Romania.
Cas has dismissed those claims as “outrageous statements”.
“The Cas condemns the outrageous statements published in certain US media alleging that the panel, and more particularly its chairman, was biased due to other professional engagements or for reasons of nationality,” it said.
“As none of the parties involved in this case has challenged any panel member during the procedure, it can reasonably be assumed that all parties were satisfied to have their case heard by this panel. Any subsequent criticism is without foundation or merit.”
The saga rumbles on more than a week after gymnastics competition concluded at Paris 2024 with USA Gymnastics vowing to explore “every possible avenue” in potentially appealing the judgement to a higher court.
The organisation has said it did not become aware of the case until 9 August, “two days past the deadline to submit objections related to panellists, and less than 24 hours before the hearing”, and that communications were sent to “erroneous email addresses”.
“This deprived us of adequate time to respond meaningfully or gather necessary evidence,” USA Gymnastics explained.
Chiles won team gold alongside Simone Biles, Sunisa Lee, Jade Carey and Hezly Rivera in Paris, adding to a silver in the event from Tokyo.
Her floor medal would have been her first in an individual Olympic competition.
