'You both tried to corrupt the sport' - six and seven-year-bans for owners guilty of instructing jockey to lose

A father and son have been disqualified from racing for a total of 13 years after being found guilty of instructing a jockey to deliberately lose on a horse they owned.

Royston Cooper was banned for seven years for breaching rule (F) 41 and his son, Royston Barney, was banned for six years for a breach of the same rule by a disciplinary panel on Thursday.

Cooper and Barney had been found guilty last month of instructing jockey Ray Dawson to stop their horse, the Henry Spiller-trained Enough Already, from winning at Yarmouth in May 2022. Dawson ignored the instruction and won the mile contest.

Dawson reported the owners’ behaviour to stewards after the race having been threatened by Cooper and Barney following the victory. Cooper had demanded Dawson pay him a six-figure sum that the win had allegedly cost him, while Barney asked why the jockey had not stopped the horse from winning by “pulling on the reins”.

Panel chair James O’Mahony said: “This is an offence against the integrity of horseracing. It’s an offence against all right-thinking people involved in the sport, from kings and princes to the punter having his accumulator on a Saturday morning.

“In all but name, Royston Cooper was as much an owner of the horse as Royston Barney as far as this case is concerned. You both tried to corrupt the sport.

“The one light of hope is that Henry Spiller and Ray Dawson were not having it. They said ‘no’ and the horse ran on its merits.”

Ray Dawson defied the instructions of two owners to lose at YarmouthCredit: Steve Bardens (Getty Images)

O’Mahony chastised Barney for “one last desperate throw of the dice” when alleging that Dawson stopped and laid horses, with the panel chair reiterating that the claim was “completely and utterly rejected” and that it acted as an aggravating factor in reaching his punishment.

Cooper and Barney were unmoved as the sentences were delivered, and indicated through their legal representative that they planned to appeal against the guilty verdict. Furthermore, an appeal by the owners to suspend publication of the sentences was rejected by the panel.

During last month’s hearing, Cooper had been found in not breach of the rules relating to the running of Enough Already at Brighton nine days before his win at Yarmouth.

However, Dawson and Spiller were found in breach of the rules having failed to report to stewards the alleged instruction to prevent the horse from winning.

Dawson received a two-month suspension, suspended for nine months, and Spiller, who stopped training in February, was handed a three-month suspension and a £3,000 fine, both of which were suspended for a year.

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Owners 'were literally begging me' not to win at Brighton, alleges jockey Ray Dawson

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