Strict owner liability and the trainer’s absolute insurer rule should not be mixed or used in conjunction. The absolute insurer rule assumes fairly or not that trainer knows all that is going on in their barn. Maybe Baffert would have noticed his groom urinating on a horse’s hay if BB was not a notorious late riser.
While penalizing owners has its good points, will never happen in places where racing offices struggle to fill races.
If an owner is caught authorizing his trainer to use PEDS, different story. Forget 30/60/90. Five year loss of license, minimum.
What concerns me is that on both coasts there are certain owners who ONLY hire the usual suspects. One would think that these owners would add a mere mortal to their roster of trainers for a better optic.
