The jockey Paul John gave a colourful and brazen account of how he claims to have stopped two horses, as the rehearing of the Jim Best case began on Monday. The matter was originally heard in February but the verdict against Best, a Lewes‑based trainer, was subsequently struck down and the matter is now being reheard over the whole of this week at the offices of the British Horseracing Authority, with an outside chance of a verdict on Friday.
John claims Best instructed him to ensure Echo Brava and Missile Man were well beaten when they raced in December, a charge Best denies. The jockey’s credibility came under immediate attack from Jonathan Laidlaw QC, acting for Best, who repeatedly pressed John on the issue of whether a deal had been done with the BHA in exchange for his evidence.
A recent gallops injury has left John with a broken collar bone and his right arm in a sling. Wincing as he gave evidence, he described his efforts to stop the two horses in terms which would infuriate any punter.
“I’d torn his teeth out for the last mile and a half,” John said, watching footage of Echo Brava crossing the line at Plumpton in fifth place, 24 lengths behind the winner. At an earlier point in the race, the jockey said: “It looks like I’m trying to give it a kick and a squeeze but you can see as I do that I’m fighting with his head. It’s deceptive on the stewards and the punters. It looks like you’re trying when you’re not.”
John claimed he had used air-shots with his whip on both horses and spoke also of giving a “show slap” or a “show push” to improve the look of a ride. He said he knew where cameras were positioned around the track and would make a visible effort when near them.
But the defence painted a picture of John as a jockey whose career was hanging by a thread after he had left the service of three other trainers within 18 months. Jump jockeys at the early ‘conditional’ phase of their career are expected to stay with their trainer for at least a year. When John signed up with Best in August 2015, the BHA sent a letter to the jockey explaining it had “significant concerns” about his employment history and noting that, if he left Best’s yard in less than a year, he would not get another licence unless there were “exceptional circumstances”.
Less than four months later, the raceday stewards found John had made insufficient effort on both Echo Brava and Missile Man. Laidlaw referred to a January email from the BHA to John’s solicitor, saying it would not seek to have him disqualified if he pleaded guilty and gave evidence that Best had told him to stop the horses. “This isn’t a deal?” Laidlaw asked John.
“There was no deal made,” the jockey insisted. “I decided to come clean about Plumpton and effectively made that one worse for myself. I’m now an amateur and I haven’t ridden since I rode for Jim Best at Lingfield [in late December].”
Laidlaw argued that John’s problems with employers arose from his being talented but “inconsistent” in the saddle and “disobedient, rude, aggressive and difficult to manage” out of it, which John denied. John claimed he left one trainer, Victor Dartnall, because he was having trouble getting time off to take his mother to hospital for cancer treatment.
In support of his case, Laidlaw showed John footage of two rides which went badly wrong for the jockey. On Mother Meldrum at Exeter, he came within a few feet of going on to the wrong course, riding straight ahead while other jockeys followed the course to the right. On Karl Marx at Wincanton, he slipped haplessly from the saddle while leading at the top of the straight.
John claimed the tumble was the result of his having lost “15lb in 12 hours” in order to make the weight for the ride. He said he had lost the weight by taking a hot bath while “covered in baby oil” and drinking a pint of water containing four tablespoons of Epsom salts.
John acknowledged that he had once fought with his fellow jockey David Bass over a mid-race incident at Uttoxeter. He denied “squaring up” to Best’s head lad, Paul Cooley, saying: “He squared up to me and then I called him a snake”.
The jockey also denied repeated suggestions from Laidlaw that he liked a drink, insisting he might only have “a little brandy at Christmas”. When the barrister produced Facebook photos of John with friends in a pub, John replied: “You can be in a pub without having a drink” and insisted that fingers shown clasped around a bottle were not his.
John also denied a suggestion from Laidlaw that he had “put up” associates of his to confront Cooley and threaten him in an effort to dissuade him from giving evidence to the first hearing in February.
Disclosure of documents has been a vexed issue throughout this case and Laidlaw ended the first day’s hearing by pressing the BHA about a meeting between the regulator and John’s solicitor on 21 January. No note of that meeting has been shared with the defence.
Laidlaw told the panel that the BHA’s barrister, Louis Weston, “assures me he has checked and looked and found nothing”. He added there had been “an unhappy history” to disclosure of documents in the case.
