Jamaican 400-metre runner Riker Hylton is in the clear after the Independent Anti-Doping Disciplinary Panel ruled yesterday that he is not guilty of committing an anti-doping violation.

The disciplinary panel, chaired by Georgia Gibson Henlin, QC, said it unanimously decided that the Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission (JADCO) failed to prove that the athlete breached Article 2.3 of the World Anti-Doping Agency (WADA) code, which speaks to evading sample collection or refusing to submit a sample for drug testing.

“JADCO has not discharged its burden of proving that Riker Hylton committed an anti-doping rule violation under Article 2.3 of the JADCO Rules, 2015 to the comfortable satisfaction of the panel.

“The charge that Riker Hylton has committed an anti-doping rule violation under Article 2.3 of the JADCO Rules, 2015 is dismissed,” Gibson Henlin said yesterday at the offices of the Sports Development Foundation as she read from a prepared document.

In addition, the panel disagreed with part of the Hylton legal team’s defence that Coach Bertland Cameron was notified of the alleged violation before the athlete, which would have constituted a breach of Article 5.3.7 of the International Standard for Testing and Investigations (ISTI).

The three-member panel, which also comprises Dr Japheth Ford and Denise Forrest, further ruled that each party bears its own cost incurred throughout the hearing.

The 28-year-old athlete, who had expressed no interest in competing at the IAAF World Championships in London set to start today, had been provisionally suspended since February 2017.

He is now free to return to competitive action.

Jamaica’s 400m hurdles star Kaliese Spencer, a club teammate of Hylton, was also recently cleared of charges arising from a similar allegation in a separate case.

Neither Hylton nor his legal representative Dr Emir Crowne was present at yesterday’s decision hearing, but the latter tuned in via teleconference.

When contacted by the Jamaica Observer via e-mail yesterday, Crowne said: “Riker is, of course, relieved and happy with the outcome.”

He later added in a WhatsApp voice note: “We are quite thankful for the panel’s reasoning. It’s a 46-page decision [and] the panel went into considerable depth in analysing everything that was put before them. We would like to thank them for their thoroughness; it is a decision that canvasses all of the possible avenues that could have been explored.”

Carey Brown, the JADCO executive director, and Lackston Robinson, the attorney representing the commission, both declined comment. The two briskly exited the conference room after the verdict was announced.

During the disciplinary hearing in May this year, Damon Smith, a JADCO chaperone, testified that Hylton refused to make himself available for testing when approached during a training session at the Stadium East track on April 27, 2016.

However, Hylton has always maintained his innocence.

While giving testimony he said that at times he was about 10 metres away from JADCO personnel as he sat at the training venue that morning. He insisted no one notified him of selection for doping control tests.

Hylton, a 400m relay bronze medallist at the 2011 World Championships in Daegu, Republic of Korea, and a semi-finalist in the individual 400m race at those same championships, could have been banned up to four years had he been found guilty.