NASCAR files court documents asking for Jeremy Mayfield's injunction to be permanently rescinded
NASCAR's latest filing argues to rescind the injunction granted Jeremy Mayfield.
// Jeff Robinson, NASCAR Scene
NASCAR filed court documents Monday stating that the sanctioning body has several witnesses to Jeremy Mayfield's alleged drug use, but that they are hesitant to come forward after Mayfield's comments about his stepmother.
As part of its case against Mayfield, NASCAR previously filed an affidavit in which Mayfield's stepmother, Lisa Mayfield, alleges that she saw Jeremy use methamphetamine. Jeremy Mayfield has disputed that allegation in his own court documents.
NASCAR suspended Mayfield for a May 1 drug test that it says showed a positive result for methamphetamines. Mayfield claims the test resulted in a false positive created by the prescription drug Adderall and the allergy medication Claritin-D. Mayfield obtained an injunction July 1 to keep NASCAR from enforcing the initial suspension.
Since then, NASCAR has gotten that injunction put on hold by the U.S. Court of Appeals, but the process to get the injunction permanently rescinded based on a July 6 drug test is still ongoing in U.S. District Court. It is in that quest that NASCAR filed more briefs on Monday.
NASCAR has asked U.S. District Court Judge Graham Mullen to rescind the injunction based on a July 6 test that NASCAR says also showed a positive result for methamphetamine. Mayfield disputes that finding and says that an independent test on the same day shows a negative result for methamphetamine.
NASCAR is responding to Mayfield's filing last week that argued that the injunction shouldn't be rescinded because he passed his independent drug test and disputed the affidavit filed by Lisa Mayfield.
"There are several other witnesses who have confirmed that they will testify about Mayfield's methamphetamine use," NASCAR says in its filing. "Because of Mayfield's defamatory tirade against Lisa Mayfield, these witnesses are reluctant to testify unless subpoenaed.
"Mayfield has apparently contacted at least one witness to convince the witness that despite her recollection, he never used drugs. As soon as NASCAR is able to subpoena these witnesses, NASCAR will supplement this record."
Among the points NASCAR also makes in its filing Monday:
• NASCAR argues that Mayfield has not attempted to race and therefore an injunction is not necessary.
• NASCAR claims that Mayfield lied in his affidavit in saying that he received a voice mail from the NASCAR testing lab, Aegis Corp., when first notified of the July 6 test. NASCAR says it has a tape of a conversation with an Aegis representative.
• NASCAR claims that Mayfield's July 6 "non-normalized" methamphetamine levels are at the relatively low end of the spectrum despite assertions by Mayfield's expert that he could be dead from such levels. NASCAR says Mayfield's expert is not an expert in addiction or methamphetamine use and that the amount of methamphetamine in Mayfield's system is not indicative of the level of the methamphetamine that a person has matriculating in his system but instead indicates only the amount of methamphetamine being held in the bladder at a particular time. NASCAR's expert is Mace Beckson, a specialist in addiction who is a faculty member at the University of California-Los Angeles.
• NASCAR questions the procedures of Mayfield's test. According to NASCAR, Mayfield's independent sample has no B sample to verify the results. NASCAR says it is unclear through the chain of custody form as to whom the specimen bottle was released to or that it was received by LabCorp. And the one result, NASCAR says, should have shown amphetamines in his system because he takes Adderall.
"Either Mayfield suddenly no longer has the disability that he told the Court he had just a month ago, or the urine that LabCorp tested was not Mayfield's," NASCAR states in its filing.
Mayfield attorney John Buric said last week that the independent test was negative for amphetamine because it was done specifically for the amphetamine that is a derivative of methamphetamine.
• NASCAR still wants the B sample it has from its July 6 test to be tested by a laboratory that can separate pseudoephederine. Mayfield wants it done by LabCorp, which can't do such a test, according to an e-mail from Buric that was submitted by NASCAR.
