Bill Bock, KGR attorney and General Counsel for the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency (USADA), will be a panelist at the 17th annual meeting of the College of Commercial Arbitrators (CCA) on Friday, October 13th.
Bill has extensive experience with athlete eligibility matters arising under specialized rules and statutes such as the Ted Stevens Olympic and Amateur Sports Act. He was involved in one of the early arbitrations under the Sports Act in 1994 and has handled numerous arbitrations under the Act since that time. He has appeared before panels of the American Arbitration Association (AAA) and/or the International Court of Arbitration for Sport (CAS) headquartered in Lausanne, Switzerland, in more than seventy-five (75+) sports eligibility disputes. The CAS is the specialized arbitral tribunal which handles international sport disputes.
Bill has served as USADA’s General Counsel since 2007. USADA is the independent entity with the responsibility to investigate and prosecute instances of drug use in Olympic and Paralympic sports involving U.S. athletes, athlete support personnel and others, (www.usada.org). Bill has direct responsibility for the investigation of potential rule violations and handles the prosecution of cases, where those charged with a rule violation may have their case heard by a panel of neutral arbitrators.
Bill was the lead attorney for USADA in the investigation of the use of performance enhancing drugs by Lance Armstrong and other members of the U.S.Postal Service Cycling Team and was the principal author of USADA’s approximately 200 page Reasoned Decision setting forth the evidence against Mr. Armstrong. For his work on the Armstrong case Bill was named a 2012 Lawyer of the Year by Law Week Colorado and a Distinguished Barrister by the Indiana Lawyer in 2013.
Bill’s work on the Armstrong case is described in New York Times bestseller list books: Wheelmen: Lance Armstrong, the Tour de France, and the Greatest Sports Conspiracy Ever by Wall Street Journal reporters Reed Albergotti and Vanessa O’Connell and Cycle of Lies: The Fall of Lance Armstrong by New York Times sports reporter Juliet Macur as well as in news articles, including “Armstrong’s Wall of Silence Fell Rider by Rider,” New York Times, October 20, 2012; “Local lawyer key figure in felling Armstrong,” Indianapolis Business Journal, October 27, 2012; “No big bad wolf behind Lance Armstrong investigation,” Indianapolis Business Journal, October 31, 2012..
In a panel at the CCA meeting entitled “Sports and Arbitration – Ultimate Umpires,” Bill will discuss the development of specialized arbitration procedures for the resolution of sports disputes. More information on the meeting can be found here. The College of Commercial Arbitrators is a national organization of leading commercial arbitrators. CCA promotes the highest standards of conduct, professionalism and ethical practice, develops “best practices,” and provides peer training and professional development.
Bill is a member of the National Collegiate Athletic Association (NCAA) Division I Committee on Infractions where he regularly hears cases involving the potential violation of NCAA rules. Bill has also served since 2009 as one of six (6) international arbitrators to adjudicate sports doping matters involving international swimmers for the international swimming federation, known as the Federation Internationale de Natation (FINA).
Bill was selected as a 2014 honoree for the NASBA Center for Public Trust’s Being a Difference Award and each year since 2015 has been named a “Super Lawyer” in the State of Indiana by Super Lawyer Magazine.
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