Former UFC Light Heavyweight Champion Jon Jones appeared at the California State Athletic Commission (CSAC) hearing today and things didn’t go very well for him. The hearing was implemented after Jones had failed a drug test in line with UFC 214, where he defeated Daniel Cormier to recapture the UFC Light Heavyweight Title.
The fighter has received two punishments from the commission, with those being a revoking of his fighting license and a fine of $205,000.
CSAC Executive Officer Andy Foster says that the revoking of Jones license will not end until the United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA) has a hearing to hand out their punishment(s) to the fighter. There is currently no date yet as to when the USADA hearing will take place, but Jones’ license with the CSAC is set to expire this coming August.
Howard Jacobs was Jones attorney and he represented the fighter during the hearing, arguing that the former champion didn’t knowingly take an illegal substance. Paul Scott was an expert witness brought in by Jones team, who stated that the fighter passed drug tests before and after the failure, which he argued was proof that Jones didn’t take something illegal on purpose.
Jones did have 15 supplements tested independently after the drug test failure was announced, but none of those supplements had any trace of Turinabol in them and that is the substance that was found in Jones sample.
During his time being questioned by the CSAC, a somber Jones says he has no clue how the failed test happened and that he isn’t the same person that messed up three years ago during the hit and run incident.
“This situation is like really, really crappy,” Jones said. “I don’t understand how any of this happened and how it got in my system. Imagine being me. I have no clue how this happened. I’m just trying to figure it out just like everybody else. To purposely do steroids like a week before a fight and ruin all those months talking to all those kids, it would just be stupid. I’m absolutely not the same person I was three years ago when I got into a hit-and-run car accident.”
One other bit of information that came out during the questioning by the CSAC was that while Jones signed documents pertaining to USADA and the drug testing policy, it was his management team had taken the USADA tutorials and had forged his signature on other related documents.
Although a USADA hearing has not yet been announced, a punishment of a four year suspension can be handed to Jones when they convene on the matter. This is the second time Jones had failed a drug test, but the first time it happened was the pre-USADA days, just before UFC 200.
