By T. D. Thornton
A federal judge in Indiana who struck down a version of the Thoroughbred industry's long-standing “claiming jail” rule in 2017 this week ordered that the plaintiffs in the case, horse owner Jerry Jamgotchian, et al., are entitled to recover $56,365 in attorney fees and costs from the defendant, the Indiana Horse Racing Commission (IHRC), et al.
District Judge William T. Lawrence (Southern District of Indiana, Indianapolis Division) wrote in a June 4 judgment that “Plaintiffs were the prevailing parties and are entitled to an award of reasonable attorneys fees.” The judge, however, disallowed some of the $65,000 in reimbursements Jamgotchian's side had sought because he deemed those costs were not directly related to the case.
This latest order comes more than eight months after the federal court ruled that an IHRC rule restricting where and when claimed horses can run is an impermissible restriction of interstate commerce.
The judge's Sep. 20, 2017, order barred the IHRC from taking any action to implement or enforce the jail rule upon the plaintiff, and it also prevented the IHRC from applying the rule to other Indiana-licensed owners or trainers.
Even though that ruling put a nationwide legal precedent on the books, it did not mean that claiming jail rules automatically changed in other states. In fact, Jamgotchian's own attorney, the Kentucky-based Barry Hunter, acknowledged to TDN when the judgment was first handed down that other owners and trainers might have to file their own lawsuits to get racing commissions in other states to roll back versions of jail rules.
After failing to get a similar jail rule overturned by the Kentucky Supreme Court in a 2011 suit that dragged on for five years, Jamgotchian, on Aug. 31, 2016, challenged Indiana's rule at the federal level after stewards at Indiana Grand racetrack refused permission for him to run several claimed horses outside the state before the IHRC-mandated 60-day period expired.
Another murky legal aspect in the wake of the 2017 ruling is that it remains unclear whether the new federal order applies to “house rules” about claiming horses in instances where privately owned individual racetracks, and not state racing commissions, establish the jail rules.
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