Chairman of the Jamaica Anti-Doping Commission (JADCO) Alexander Williams is warning Jamaican athletes that they must take anti-doping drug testing very seriously or they run the risk of being banned from the sports for years if they violate the rules.

Williams’ comments came after it was disclosed Friday that charge has been brought against Jamaican quarter-miler Christopher Taylor by the Athletics Integrity Unit (AIU) for violating the World Anti-Doping Agency’s (WADA) Anti-Doping Code Article 2.3.

The charge came to light after the AIU’s six-month investigation determined that Taylor evaded a doping test in November 2022.

Williams said that athletes must sensitise and educate themselves about the WADA’s testing policies in order to prevent them from committing offences.

“The athletes must take anti-doping seriously because we can’t be wishy-washy about the thing,” Williams told the Jamaica Observer.

“You have obligations to deal with, so file your whereabouts when you are supposed to file them. Don’t tell a man strictly 10 o’clock on a particular day when and then you are not there and you don’t alert them that there is an emergency and you have to leave,” he said.

“Just be professional about it and don’t make these fool-fool things reach you. No athletes in the world can claim to say that they don’t know what the rules are,” Williams stated.

He shared that there are many social media platforms for which athletes can go to read up on the WADA and JADCO anti-doping rules and testing policies.

“They [rules] are all over the WADA website, JADCO website and we have regular seminars and we are all across social media and so you can’t reach a certain level and you don’t know,” Williams said.

Meanwhile, Garth Gayle, president of the Jamaica Athletics Administrative Association (JAAA), said his organisation is aware of Taylor’s situation.

“We are aware of the alleged anti-doping rule violation involving our athlete Christopher Taylor. He has legal representation and is going through the process,” said Gayle.

WADA’s Anti-Doping Code Article 2.3 states that a violation is commited when “Evading, refusing or failing to submit to sample collection. The evading sample collection, or without compelling justification, refusing or failing to submit to sample collection after notification as authorised in applicable anti-doping rules.”

Taylor now risks a minimum two-year ban from the sport according to WADA Anti-Doping Rule 10.3.1.

“For violations of Article 2.3 or Article 2.5, the period of ineligibility shall be four years unless, in the case of failing to submit to sample collection, the athlete can establish that the commission of the anti-doping rule violation was not intentional [as defined in Article 10.2.3], in which case the period of ineligibility shall be two years,” the rule state.s