\nFabiola Sanchez, Associated Press
\n\tCARACAS, Venezuela (AP) \u2013 It sounds like a page-turning novel: Venezuelan authorities say a gambling ring poisons one of the country\u2019s most popular race horses ahead of a key derby, nearly killing the animal and shining a light on an underworld where millions of dollars in bets are made under the table.<\/p>\n
\tBut the attack on 4-year-old Rio Negro as he prepared for the Army Day derby was real, and just the latest grim milestone in a wave of lawlessness and violence that has made Venezuela one of the world\u2019s deadliest places.<\/p>\n
\tThe horse is still struggling to regain his strength after almost dying. There have been other cases of using poison to \u201csleep\u201d a race horse in Venezuela, including three in the last year. But the attention thrust on Rio Negro\u2019s dramatic plight by the media and top level government officials has underscored the growing brazenness of well-organized betting rings that many say threatens to destroy a sport nearly as popular here as baseball.<\/p>\n
\tRio Negro had been heavily favored to win the derby until criminals injected him with a near-fatal overdose of cortisone sometime in June \u2013 police aren\u2019t exactly sure when.<\/p>\n
\tHis caretakers say he nearly collapsed and began urinating frequently during a training session four days before the June 22 race. He lost almost a fifth of his weight, his black-colored skin broke out in welts and he was diagnosed with temporary diabetes.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cIt was painful to watch,\u201d said Julio Lobo, one of his veterinarians.<\/p>\n
\tRio Negro is now kept in a dark, cold stable that looks more like a prison with iron bars and proliferation of security cameras to ward off intruders.<\/p>\n
\tAuthorities have arrested nine people, among them former police officers and a horse owner linked to betting rings. But it\u2019s unknown if the investigation, an outcry from top government officials and beefed-up security at La Rinconada track in Caracas can control the rings that some racing officials call \u201cmafias.\u201d<\/p>\n
\tGambling on horse races is legal in Venezuela, but the socialist government tightly controls betting at the country\u2019s four racetracks and 1,200 off-track betting houses. Illegal gambling is driven by the government\u2019s limit of 1,000 bolivars on bets, or about $10 at the black market rate. Last year, the industry in Venezuela handled about $120 million in legal bets, according to the Paris-based International Federation of Horseracing Authorities.<\/p>\n
\tBut Jaime Casas and others who follow the local horse racing industry say the real money is in illegal betting, especially now as Venezuelans try to boost the value of their bolivars in the face of 60 percent inflation and a plunge in the currency\u2019s value on the black market. The illegal operations known as \u201coffices\u201d can frequently be seen operating in plain view from inside the state-sanctioned gambling halls by so-called \u201cbankers\u201d who receive bets in person and by phone.<\/p>\n
\tVenezuela\u2019s state-run National Institute of Hippodromes declined to comment on the illicit operations.<\/p>\n
\tCasas, who runs the Hipicomputo 2000 website that tracks race results, estimated that illicit betting rings move between 50 and 60 times the legal market for gambling. The state-run horse racing agency says that on any given Sunday the government\u2019s take from wagers at La Rinconada can surpass $3 million.<\/p>\n
\tCasas said violence has also increasingly encroached on the sport through the kidnapping of and threats against jockeys.<\/p>\n
\t\u201cIllegal betting has existed in every part of the world for a long time,\u201d he said. \u201cBut here it was allowed to flourish with so much freedom and impunity.\u201d<\/p>\n
No replies were posted for this topic.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Fabiola Sanchez, Associated Press CARACAS, Venezuela (AP) \u2013 It sounds like a page-turning novel: Venezuelan authorities say a gambling ring poisons one of the country\u2019s most popular race horses ahead of a key derby, nearly killing the animal and shining…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":36,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[15],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8121","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-other-games"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8121","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/36"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8121"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8121\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8121"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8121"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/forumarchives.tmsites.net\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8121"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}