American track coach Lee Evans banned in PED case involving a minor

African sports officials have banned Lee Evans, an American gold medalist and Fulbright scholar, from coaching for four years after he allegedly gave performance-enhancing drugs to a young athlete.

The penalty was announced Tuesday by the Athletics Federation of Nigeria, which also issued a lifetime ban for the young woman’s coach, Abass Rauf.

Officials became aware of the situation after the athlete — a minor who was not named — failed a urine test.

Evans acknowledged supplying the girl with supplements, amino acid and a sport drink while working as a consultant in Lagos in early 2013. He said he did not think anything he gave her contained banned substances.

The girl also told officials that Abass took her to a doctor where she was injected with an unknown substance that made her collapse.

After she was revived, she said, Abass warned her not to tell anyone about what had happened. She later confided in her mother and cooperated with an official investigation.

Evans grew up in California and attended San Jose State. He won two golds at the 1968 Mexico City Games, where he and fellow athletes wore berets on the podium in support of the Black Power movement. He had a history of coaching in the U.S. and Africa.