Former world No 5 snooker player Stephen Lee has been banned for 12 years after being found guilty of seven charges of match-fixing last week.
Independent tribunal chairman Adam Lewis QC stopped short of handing down the life ban urged by governing body the World Professional Billiards and Snooker Association (WPBSA), concluding after having considered Lee’s individual circumstances that: “I do not regard a life-time ban as proportionate, or as necessary in order to deter [from match fixing]”
Characterisng the 38-year-old from Wiltshire “as a weak man who under financial pressure, succumbed to the temptation” rather than a “cynical cheat”, Lewis’ ruling pointed out that the seven documented breaches during 2008 and 2009 had occurred when the snooker player “was in a financially perilous state not entirely of his own making and was finding it difficult to obtain entry to enough tournaments.”
The QC also concluded it “unlikely that [Lee] was the prime mover or instigator of the activity” and that it had not been established that any of the incidences of fixing had actually altered the end result of the matches, a rationale Lewis argued that Lee had used to justify his activity. These were also the snooker player’s first offences in 20 years as a pro, “and he is generally of good character”, said Lewis, who pointed out Lee was “once again in a financially perilous state” having been suspended from WPBSA-sanctioned tournaments since October last year.
The ban will prevent Lee from earning a living playing snooker in any game held under the WPBSA’s rules until 12 October 2024, 12 years from when the interim suspension occurred. He was also ordered to pay £40,000 towards the WPBSA’s costs of investigating “a complex matter”.
Today’s sanction follows the independent tribunal last week agreeing with the WPBSA’s conclusion that Lee had deliberately lost matches against Marco Fu and Ken Doherty at the 2008 Malta Cup, as well as by pre-arranged scores to Ryan Day in the 2009 World Championship, Neil Robertson at the 2008 Malta Cup and Mark Selby at the 2009 China Open. Lee was also found guilty of deliberately throwing the opening frames in matches against Stephen Hendry and Mark King at the 2008 UK Championship.
Three groups associated with Lee, including one led by his manager of the time Neil Clague, were established to have collected at least £97,000 in winnings by betting online based on inside information Lee had passed on to them, with related payments of £43,000 from these bets being paid into the bank account of Lee’s wife.
Lee’s ban outstrips the eight years handed to Australian Quinten Hann in 2006 after he was filmed agreeing to lose his first-round match against Ken Doherty at the China Open in 2005 by undercover Sun journalists.
Article written by Katy Stirland
