Sand Diego could have sold for £300,000 says trainer Gibson as High Court case continues

Sand Diego was “tailor made” to race in Hong Kong and could have been expected to sell for £300,000 or more had he not succumbed to an infection, a court heard on Thursday.

The valuation of Sand Diego formed a key part of the fourth day of a hearing at the High Court in London with his owner-trainer Peter Crate, via his company J&J Franks Limited, suing Shotter & Byers Equine Veterinary Practice for negligent treatment after the three-year-old died in February, 2020.

Crate’s team allege Sand Diego died because attending vet Dr Barbara Portal failed to administer antibiotics on the morning of her second visit to treat the horse, having become convinced that swelling on his off-hind hock was caused by a blunt-force trauma, and that she was negligent in bandaging the affected leg for a 38-hour period. 

The defence maintains the horse was "doomed" as the bacteria he was infected with was multidrug resistant and that bandaging was an acceptable treatment.

On the first day of the hearing, Crate spelled out how he would not have considered offers for Sand Diego as “he was going to be a superstar as far as I was concerned” and that he would have hoped to continue to train the horse for many years.

On Tuesday, Richard Gibson, a trainer in Hong Kong, told the court via video link that he had spoken with Crate the day after Sand Diego had won a 5f juvenile maiden at Sandown in September 2019 with the intention of making an offer to buy the horse.

“I quickly established in my first conversation with him that Mr Crate was a wealthy man and that he did not need to sell his horse,” Gibson said. “It would have taken an offer well over the market price to acquire him. I felt a valuation of £300,000-£350,000 was entirely reasonable.”

Richard Gibson: "A valuation of £300,000-£350,000 was entirely reasonable"Credit: Edward Whitaker

During cross-examination, Gibson said that even if Sand Diego had suffered from cellulitis, the infection that led to him being put down, but had recovered following treatment and passed the vetting to be sold to Hong Kong in February 2020 the horse’s value would still be “around £175,000-£200,000”.

The valuation placed on Sand Diego by Gibson was on Thursday supported by bloodstock agent Johnny McKeever, who appeared via video link. McKeever told the court a horse’s valuation is at its highest immediately after its most recent performance.

He said: “The point about selling horses to Hong Kong is that once they have reached a certain rating provided that doesn’t change they are still saleable. I think the original value placed on the horse of £300,000 [in September 2019] would have been a good value and if they had still been in a position of wanting to sell the horse five months later I would have put a value of £200,000-£225,000 on the horse. He was tailor-made for Hong Kong.”

However, bloodstock agent Larry Stratton informed the court his valuation of Sand Diego in February 2020 would have been closer to £45,000 as it was several months after his last run and that the form of his win was “heavily discounted” by that point.

Further criticism of Portal’s decision to bandage Sand Diego was provided by Professor Mark Holmes. Asked by defence barrister Patrick Lawrence KC when the “point of no return” was during the treatment the horse received, Holmes said: “Once the bandage had been on for 24 hours. The fate of Sand Diego was sealed and he was doomed from that point onwards.”

However, Holmes’s credibility as an expert witness for the claimant was called into question when he admitted to errors in his expert report prepared for the court, with Lawrence labelling it “slapdash”.

“I do not think I have served the court with the diligence and duty I should have,” Holmes said.

The final day of the hearing takes place on Friday.

Read these next: 

Trainer's counsel accuses vet of altering medical records as High Court case continues 

Defence claim that horse was 'doomed' to die refuted as trainer's case against vet continues in High Court 

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