BBC Report - Wednesday, 14 November, 2001, 11:17 GMT

Gone to the Dogs

Paul Kenyon reveals the dark side of greyhound racing and exposes a world of race fixing and dog doping.

Kenyon buys his own dog and, after learning how to pass himself off as an owner and trainer, gains access to the murkier side of the sport.

He also discovers a mass grave for dogs - which helps to explain what happens to some of the 10,000 dogs that retire from racing each year.

During the programme Kenyon takes a master class in drugging dogs, meets a trainer fixing races and goes on a midnight dig at the greyhounds' graveyard.

Sunday, 2 December, 2001, 09:01 GMT
Greyhound race fixing exposed

Paul Kenyon about to confront a race fixer

The BBC has exposed race fixing and dog doping within Britain's second biggest spectator sport.

BBC One's Kenyon Confronts presenter Paul Kenyon infiltrated the greyhound racing world by posing as an owner and trainer.

The undercover investigation found a trainer at one of London's top tracks who fixes races and a man selling drugs for dogs at tracks throughout northern England.

Each year £1.5bn is gambled on the dogs in the UK.

However, according to one of the most experienced kennel hands in the sport, a huge number of races are fixed, particularly those run on non-official tracks.

Over-feeding dogs

On camera, the kennel hand admits to fixing hundreds of races, and claims the public has more chance of winning the lottery than making money at the dogs.

Trainer Lennie Knell and colleague Colin West are caught on secret camera offering to fix a race by over-feeding a dog at a race track in Catford, south London.

At one point Mr West boasts they made £11,000 from a fixed race.

Trainer Mr Knell warned the BBC undercover team: "You can't mention this to anyone because, obviously, what I'm doing is illegal."

At a track in northern England a well known greyhound drug dealer sold the Kenyon Confronts team various drugs to speed up, and slow down, dogs.

The dealer said the strongest drug he uses is cocaine and claims to have made £29,000 in one day on fixed races.

Mass grave

The programme also discovered a mass grave for dogs in Oxfordshire.

An estimated 10,000 greyhounds retire from racing each year but only a small number are re-homed, as many disappear in mysterious circumstances.

Trainer Steve Davis keeps hundreds of dogs at his kennels in Oxfordshire and, according to former workers, has shot dozens with an unlicensed sawn-off rifle.

They said Davis saw greyhounds as a commodity and killed them once they were too old or injured to race.

In a late night raid the Kenyon Confronts team dug up some of Davis' land and found the mass grave hiding the carcass of one dead greyhound and the bones of others.

Story from www.news.bbc.co.uk, 2/14/01