Thursday, May 13, 2010

Marion Jones is blut 2010


marion_jones.jpgSeven years after winning a women’s record five Olympic track and field medals and snagging multimillion-dollar endorsement deals, Marion Jones is broke.

The sprinter is heavily in debt, fighting off court judgments and down to a bank balance of about $2,000, according to recent court records reviewed by the Los Angeles Times.

Last year a bank foreclosed on her $2.5-million mansion in an area of Chapel Hill, N.C., where Michael Jordan was a neighbor. She was also forced to sell two other properties, including her mother’s house, to raise money.


Jones’ financial woes were revealed in a 168-page deposition in a breach-of-contract suit she filed in Dallas against veteran track coach Dan Pfaff. Pfaff countersued and won a judgment against Jones for about $240,000 in unpaid training fees and legal expenses.

img-090906-023onlinebild.jpgLegal bills have plagued Jones since 2003, when suspicions of drug use emerged and she was linked to the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO) after a federal raid. Jones retained attorneys for her BALCO grand jury testimony, for negotiations with the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency in her fight to avoid being banned from competition, for a defamation lawsuit she filed against BALCO founder Victor Conte, who accused her of taking performance-enhancing drugs, and for taking on Pfaff in her breach-of-contract suit.

Last year, a Jones urine sample tested positive for the performance-enhancing drug EPO. Jones immediately quit a European track tour and returned to the United States. Although she was cleared when a backup sample tested negative, she missed at least five major international meets, forfeiting an estimated $300,000 in appearance and performance fees.

In her prime, Jones was one of track’s first female millionaires, typically earning between $70,000 and $80,000 a race, plus at least another $1 million from race bonuses and endorsement deals.