Ned Bonnie, Dancer's Image attorney, dies at 88

Edward S. “Ned” Bonnie, a Louisville attorney whose representation in the landmark Dancer’s Image case 50 years ago ushered in a new era for the adjudication of drug positives in Thoroughbred racing, died Saturday, according to reports. Bonnie was 88.

Bonnie cemented his reputation in the equestrian world when he was hired to represent Peter Fuller after Fuller’s horse, Dancer’s Image, was disqualified from first in the 1968 Kentucky Derby after testing positive for phenylbutazone, a painkiller that at the time was treated as a zero-tolerance drug. Though the decision to disqualify the horse was ultimately upheld, the case introduced lines of questioning that would become standard in future cases in which horsemen challenged drug positives.

Bonnie would go on to act as legal counsel for scores of racing licensees over the next 40 years as an attorney for Frost Brown Todd in Louisville. In his later years, he became an impassioned member of the Kentucky Horse Racing Commission, arguing forcefully for tighter regulation of medications and a heavier hand in meting out punishments for violators of racing’s medication rules, sometimes to the consternation of the licensees he had represented in the past.

In addition, Bonnie played a role in the drafting of the Interstate Horseracing Act in the early 1970s as the legal counsel for the National Horsemen’s Benevolent and Protective Association. The federal legislation, passed in 1978, continues to serve as the legal foundation for interstate simulcasting, which today provides approximately 90 percent of the racing industry’s wagering revenues.

Bonnie was a lifelong horseman, and he owned, broke, and trained hunters, jumpers, and steeplechasers on a 530-acre cattle farm he owned with his wife Cornelia Winthrop Bonnie in Oldham County just outside Louisville. He was a graduate of Yale Law School.

Bonnie was a recipient of the Keene Daingerfield Award for “substantial contributions to the education and professionalism of stewards and judges,” and he received a Lifetime Achievement Award for the Advancement of Equestrian Sports from the United States Equestrian Federation.