Robbie Dunne handed 18-month ban for bullying rival jockey Bryony Frost

12/09/2021

Robbie Dunne has been handed an 18-month ban for bullying and harassing rival jockey Bryony Frost over a sustained period.

Dunne, 36, was given the punishment, with three months of it suspended, at the conclusion of an independent disciplinary panel hearing.

He was found guilty of four breaches of racing's rule (J) 19 – that he had engaged in “conduct prejudicial to the integrity, proper conduct and good reputation of horse racing by bullying and harassing a fellow jockey”.

The case related to the time between 13 February 2020 and 3 September 2020.

Delivering the decision, panel chairman Brian Barker said Dunne's behaviour "progressed from distasteful targeting to deliberate harassment both on and off the course, including occasional cases of dangerous bullying."

Barker said Frost was "truthful, careful and compelling" when giving evidence to the six-day hearing.

Dunne was found by the panel to have threatened Frost by promising to “put her through a wing (of a fence).”

Barker added: "We have real concern the weighing room culture is deep rooted and coercive and is not conducive to the good health and development of race-riding."

Around the time the verdict was delivered, Frost, 26, rode the winner of the first race at Warwick aboard Graystone.

Barker said: "By taking her complaint to the authority she has broken the code [of the weighing room], knowing that her isolation – and rejection by some – was inevitable.

"In acknowledging after the Southwell race (on September 3, 2020) Mr Dunne believed that Ms Frost was the cause of his mount's death and that he had suffered a fall, we are unable to accept Mr Dunne's sweep of denials, criticisms and his reasons."

Throughout the case, Barker and fellow panel members HH James O'Mahony and Alison Royston listened to submissions from the British Horseracing Authority's representative Louis Weston and Roderick Moore, for Dunne.

Weston said in his closing remarks to the case that Dunne subjected Frost to a "vendetta."

He told the case the two jockeys fell out in 2017 when Dunne “displayed his naked self” to her in a changing room “in a way that was unacceptable and obviously so”.

Dunne said being it was not a sexual act and he could only recall being undressed by her when leaving the sauna.

Yesterday Weston referenced Frost's second witness statement in which she alleged the situation with her colleague was "increasingly getting worse" and she began to question her ability in the saddle.

"I love riding my horses but that day at Southwell, 3rd September 2020 was the day when I brought my saddle in and I thought to myself 'I don't want to be here' and 'I don't care if this is the last time I put the saddle on the table' – and I knew that i had to do something about it," said Frost, relayed by Weston.

Dunne, who blamed Frost's riding for the fatal fall of his horse Cillian's Well on that date, admitted one count of acting in a violent or improper manner towards her.

He denied two other counts of that nature and four of the conduct prejudicial to horse racing.

Dunne claimed it was not a "threat" and he was using a "figure of speech" when he told Frost he would put her through the wing (side) of a fence.

Moore suggested the BHA case was a "jigsaw puzzle with numerous missing pieces."

But Barker ruled: “In our view she (Frost) has supported (her case) in a number of areas. The first is the published comments on the Virtual Grand National, the second is the apology at Bangor, the third is the video of the encounter in the pull-up area at Stratford combined with the independent evidence of the fence attendant.

“Also the acceptance of at least some offensive behaviour at Southwell which was followed by Ms Frost’s report to the BHA, and the evidence of Ms (Hannah) Welch (former amateur jockey), which we also found persuasive in admissible support.”

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