Jonathan Broome, the former assistant general manager of Lakes Region Greyhound Park in New Hampshire who was indicted with 16 other people last year in a high-profile illegal gambling case, was sentenced Thursday to one year of probation in U.S. District Court in Manhattan, according to Broome's attorney, Richard Signorelli.

A top official in the Department of Justice said during a hearing in Washington on Wednesday that his unit is conducting a "civil investigation" of the horse racing industry's widespread practice of accepting bets over state lines.

Bruce Ohr, the chief of the U.S. Department of Justice's Organized Crime and Racketeering Section, told the Judiciary Subcommittee of the House of Representatives that existing laws prohibit interstate betting on horse races, according to a copy of his remarks that he supplied to the committee.

Federal prosecutors have secured guilty pleas from five people who were indicted last year in connection with an illegal gambling operation and a conspiracy to bet on a horse who was given a banned substance before a race at Aqueduct in 2003, according to court records.

Greg Martin, a trainer who was formerly based at Aqueduct, pleaded guilty on March 23 to one count of conspiracy to dope a racehorse, according to records from U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York.

The New Jersey State Police have arrested four associates of Seldon Ledford, a leading harness racing trainer, on charges of administering blood-doping drugs to horses who raced under Ledford's name at The Meadowlands.

A Pennsylvania-based real-estate development company has withdrawn from an agreement to purchase 157 acres of south Florida land from Magna Entertainment Corp., Magna officials said on Tuesday.

Animal pathologists in Florida have confirmed that two recent foal deaths and one late-term abortion in the state were consistent with the medical phenomenon known as mare reproductive loss syndrome, a veterinarian at the University of Florida's Veterinary College of Medicine said Monday.

The abortion came to the attention of pathologists this weekend, according to the veterinarian, Dr. Dana Zimmel, and it was quickly diagnosed as being consistent with the syndrome, known as MRLS. The abortion occurred on March 13, Zimmel said.

The Kentucky Equine Drug Council approved on Monday an advisory alerting horsemen and veterinarians to refrain from administering the painkiller naproxen within five days of a race.

The New York Racing Association has pushed back its estimate for opening a slot-machine casino at Aqueduct racetrack until at least April of 2007, eight months before the association's franchise to operate Aqueduct and two other tracks expires.

Thoroughbred racetracks in Pennsylvania are gearing up for massive construction projects as the state inches toward granting them licenses to take bets through slot machines.

Claiborne Farm in Paris, Ky., has purchased a minority share of the breeding rights to multiple graded stakes winner First Samurai from owners Bruce Lunsford and Lansdon Robbins and will stand the horse at stud after he retires, Claiborne officials and Robbins said Thursday.