Dutrow ban discussion not on Gaming Commission agenda

The agenda for a Monday meeting of the New York Gaming Commission does not include an item sought by supporters of the banned trainer Rick Dutrow to reconsider his 10-year penalty.

Though the lack of an agenda item does not preclude the commission from discussing the proposal during the usual call for “new business” at the end of the meeting, the commission appears unlikely at this time to weigh the penalty, which Dutrow began serving early in 2013. Dutrow’s supporters had said this week that they believed it was likely the commission would schedule the discussion for the July 16 meeting.

A spokesman for the gaming commission, Brad Maione, said that it is the commission’s policy not to comment on what items might be brought up under the “new business” heading.

Supporters of Dutrow have been pushing the commission to reconsider the 10-year ban for more than two years, using letters of support for the trainer from former owners and other racing participants. In March, they launched an internet petition to press the commission to take up the possibility of “clemency” for the trainer, once one of the most high-profile trainers in the game.

Dutrow had his license revoked and was banned from seeking a license for ten years in 2011 under a hearing officer’s recommendation that his ongoing participation in racing “was “inconsistent with the best interests” of the sport. He continued to train as his lawyers appealed the sentence, but in 2013, with a series of court rulings supporting the commission’s penalty behind him, he began serving the ban.