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The orchestrator of the plot, who masterminded a plan to provide stealthy performance-enhancing drugs to elite sports stars including baseball icons Barry Bonds and Jason Giambi and Olympic track champion Jones decades ago, has passed away. His age was 75.

Government Probe and Legal Outcomes

The federal government's probe of another company Conte founded, the Bay Area lab, culminated in the convictions of Marion Jones, elite sprint cyclist Tammy Thomas, and former NFL defensive lineman Dana Stubblefield, along with trainers, suppliers, chemists, attorneys, and coaches.

Public Statements and Sentencing

The Balco founder, who completed a third of a year in a penitentiary for dealing steroids, spoke openly about his famous former clients. He appeared on television to state he had seen triple Olympic champion Marion Jones self-administer with HGH, but consistently avoided incriminating Bonds, the San Francisco Giants slugger.

Sport's Official Review

This probe led to the publication Game of Shadows. Just days following the publication date in that year, the sport's chief Bud Selig hired former senate majority leader Mitchell to look into PED use.

He admitted he distributed steroids referred to as certain undetectable drugs and coached on their use to dozens of elite athletes, including Giambi, a multiple-time All-Star, the Mitchell report said.

“The illegal use of PEDs represents a major risk to the fairness of the game,” the findings emphasized. “Prevalent consumption by athletes of such substances unfairly disadvantages the those who refuse to cheat who decline to take them and creates doubts about the legitimacy of historical stats.”

Mitchell indicated the challenges didn’t develop overnight. He said all parties in professional baseball in the preceding decades – covering commissioners, management, the players’ association and athletes themselves – shared some responsibility for what he called the doping period.

Case Inception

The government's case into Balco was initiated by a tax agent examining the corporate garbage. Conte ended up pleading guilty to two of the 42 charges against him in 2005 ahead of a court case. Half a dozen of the individuals found guilty were ensnared for lying to grand jurors.

Related Cases

Bonds’ personal trainer Greg Anderson, admitted guilt to drug dealing counts stemming from his ties to the lab. The court gave him to three months in prison and three months of home confinement.

His Court Proceedings

The home run king was indicted for providing false statements to a grand jury about obtaining PEDs and faced a trial in that year. The government abandoned the charges down the line when the prosecutors opted not to challenge an overturned obstruction of justice conviction to the highest court.

A decorated player and star performer, he concluded his playing days after the 2007 campaign with 762 home runs, exceeding the mark of that number that Hank Aaron achieved from 1954-76. Bonds denied intentionally taking PEDs but has failed to gain entry to the sport's hall of honor.

Conte's Post-Prison Life

Conte remarked to the press in a 2010 discussion that “yes, athletes cheat to triumph, but the government agents and prosecutors engage in misconduct as well.” He doubted whether the conclusions in such legal cases were worth the resources.

Post-incarceration, he resumed operations in 2007 by resuscitating a nutritional supplements business he had launched years before called Scientific Nutrition for Advanced Conditioning or SNAC System. He set up shop in the very same place that was home to his former lab in Burlingame.

Defiant Stance

Conte stayed unrepentant about his central role in providing designer steroids to professional competitors. He maintained he simply helped “level the playing field” in a sports environment teeming with cheaters.

Critical Perspectives

To an expert, a at the time a member of the WADA, he was essentially pushing illegal narcotics. “You are talking about blatant drug dealing. This refers to substance use in breach of national statutes,” Wadler said in 2007. “It's not a good deed and this is not some do-gooding. This is drug dealing.”