Lance Armstrong Faces Legal Challenge from U.S. Government
After Nike pulled their sponsorship and his various other sources of income quietly backed out of deals, disgraced cyclist Lance Armstrong probably thought things couldn’t get much worse.
Enter the United States Government.
Clearly short of a few dollars, the U.S. Justice Department is seeking to recoup the sponsorship paid to Lance by the U.S. Postal Service during his Tour de France ‘victories’.
Armstrong and his teammates from Tailwind Sports were paid US$40m by the Postal Service from 1998 to 2004, according to the lawsuit. Armstrong himself was paid around $17 million, but the claim applies to the entire team’s sponsorship.
Authorities are suing under the False Claims Act which means that they if successful, they can recoup up to three times the amount it lost as a result of the fraud.
Stripped of his seven Tour de France titles and banned for life from cycling in 2012, the new suit could well leave the Texan in dire financial straits. Earlier this month he sold his ranch in Texas for just $3 million dollars – a third of the price he paid for it in 2004.
@RVP Gets Some Unwelcome Attention on Twitter
It was Robin van Persie who scored all three goals for Manchester United in their win over Aston Villa this week. The hat trick cleared the path for the club to claim a record breaking 20th English Premier League title.
Naturally fans were delighted and wanted to share their appreciation with him directly – and these days where better to do that on social media?
Before long the praise flooded in to the Twitter account @RVP.
“Congrats @rvp!!” is one tweet. “@rvp You really made the difference for us this season, well done,” is another.
“Great scenes as @RVP celebrates winning his first title at United… Well done mate” and “@rvp hey Robin, that was a fantastic hat trick…can you send me a shirt please,” are others.
The problem is that despite it being the initials that the striker goes under, @RVP wasn’t “RVP”‘s Twitter account.
“RVP is the account of Ravi Visvesvaraya Sharada Prasad, a telecom & infotech consultant in India. RVP is NOT the account of Robin van Persie,” the owner tweeted.
“This is NOT the Twitter account of Robin Van Persie. Please do NOT mention @rvp if you mean Robin Van Persie.”
But of course that didn’t stop the happy Tweeters…
“Congratulations to @RVP you fully deserved it. Incredible since you are a part time footballer & info tech consultant. #CHAMPIONS2013,” tweeted one.