Victor Conte Jr. (born July 10, 1950) is an American musician and businessman who was the founder and president of

Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative The Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (BALCO) was an American company that operated from 1983 to 2003 led by founder and owner Victor Conte. In 2003, journalists Lance Williams and Mark Fainaru-Wada investigated the company's role in a drug s ...

(BALCO), which is now defunct. BALCO was a sports nutrition center in California. In the late seventies Conte played bass with R&B group

Tower of Power Tower of Power is an American R&B and funk based band and horn section, originating in Oakland, California, that has been performing since 1968. The band has had a number of lead vocalists, the best-known being Lenny Williams, who fronted ...

, appearing on the band's 1978 release ''

We Came to Play! ''We Came to Play!'' is an album by the American band Tower of Power, released in 1978. It marked the debut of singer Michael Jeffries, who would stay with T.O.P. through the mid-1980s. Steve Cropper produced the album. It peaked at No. 89 on ...

''. Conte served time in prison in 2005 after pleading guilty to conspiracy to distribute

steroid A steroid is an organic compound with four fused compound, fused rings (designated A, B, C, and D) arranged in a specific molecular configuration. Steroids have two principal biological functions: as important components of cell membranes t ...

s and to money laundering. He currently operates Scientific Nutrition for Advanced Conditioning (SNAC Nutrition).

Early life and music career

Victor Conte Jr. was born in 1950 in Fresno to Shirley and Victor Conte Sr. He is the oldest of three children in a

working-class The working class is a subset of employees who are compensated with wage or salary-based contracts, whose exact membership varies from definition to definition. Members of the working class rely primarily upon earnings from wage labour. Most c ...

Italian family. After graduating from

McLane High School McLane High School is a 9-12 public high school in Fresno, California, United States. Located at the corner of Cedar and Clinton, it is part of the Fresno Unified School District. Programs and activities Advance Via Individual Determination ( ...

he attended

Fresno City College Fresno City College (FCC or "Fresno City") is a public community college in Fresno, California. It is part of the State Center Community College District within the California Community Colleges system. Fresno City College operates on a semeste ...

but dropped out of college in 1969 after being convinced by his cousin, musician

Bruce Conte Bruce Anthony Conte (March 3, 1950 – August 8, 2021) was an American R&B and jazz fusion guitarist, known primarily for his work with the band Tower of Power, of which he was a member from 1972 to 1979. He performed on seven albums, and rej ...

, to join the band Common Ground as its bass player. In 1970 he quit playing in Common Ground and joined the band

Pure Food and Drug Act The s:Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, Pure Food and Drug Act of 1906, also known as the Wiley Act and Harvey Washington Wiley, Dr. Wiley's Law, was the first of a series of significant consumer protection laws enacted by the United States Con ...

. At the time Conte's nickname was "

Walking Fish A walking fish, or ambulatory fish, is a fish that is able to travel over ecoregion#Terrestrial, land for extended periods of time. Some other modes of non-standard fish locomotion include "walking" along the seabed, sea floor, for example, in ha ...

", due to his unusual way of moving across the stage when he was performing. He left Pure Food and Drug Act some time prior to 1977. He was a member of

from 1977 until 1979 playing bass guitar. He also collaborated during that period with pianist

Herbie Hancock Herbert Jeffrey Hancock (born April 12, 1940) is an American jazz musician, bandleader, and composer. He started his career with trumpeter Donald Byrd's group. Hancock soon joined the Miles Davis Quintet, where he helped to redefine the role of ...

and violinist

Sugarcane Harris Sugarcane or sugar cane is a species of tall, perennial grass (in the genus '' Saccharum'', tribe Andropogoneae) that is used for sugar production. The plants are 2–6 m (6–20 ft) tall with stout, jointed, fibrous stalks that are rich in su ...

Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative

In 1984, Conte founded the Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative (BALCO), a sports nutrition center first located in

Millbrae, California Millbrae is a city located in northern San Mateo County, California, San Mateo County, California, United States. To the northeast is San Francisco International Airport; San Bruno, California, San Bruno is to the northwest, and Burlingame, Cal ...

and later relocated to Burlingame, California. The

United States Anti-Doping Agency The United States Anti-Doping Agency (USADA, ) is a non-profit, non-governmental 501(c)(3) organization and the national anti-doping organization (NADO) for the United States. To protect clean competition and the integrity of sport and prevent ...

(USADA) says he developed the banned steroid

tetrahydrogestrinone Tetrahydrogestrinone (THG), known by the nickname The Clear, is a synthetic and orally active anabolic–androgenic steroid (AAS) which was never marketed for medical use. It was developed by Patrick Arnold and was used by a number of high-profi ...

(nicknamed "The Clear") with the help of bodybuilding chemist

Patrick Arnold Patrick Arnold (born 1966) is an American organic chemist known for introducing androstenedione, 1-androstenediol, and methylhexanamine into the dietary supplement market, and for creating the designer steroid tetrahydrogestrinone, also know ...

. Pursuant to a plea bargain struck with prosecutors, he entered guilty pleas in July 2005 to one count of conspiracy to distribute steroids and a second count of laundering a portion of a check. He was sentenced in October of the same year to four months in the federal

Taft Correctional Institution Taft Correctional Institution was a low-security federal prison for male inmates located in Taft, California, Taft, Kern County, California, owned by the Federal Bureau of Prisons (BOP) and operated by Management and Training Corporation under co ...

Taft, California Taft (formerly Moron, Moro, and Siding Number Two) is a city in the foothills at the extreme southwestern edge of the San Joaquin Valley, in Kern County, California. Taft is located west-southwest of Bakersfield, California, Bakersfield, at an ...

, with four months on house arrest. In a December 2004 interview with

Martin Bashir Martin Henry Bashir (born 19 January 1963) is a British former journalist. He was a presenter on British and American television and for the BBC's '' Panorama'' programme, for which he gained an interview with Diana, Princess of Wales under fal ...

ABC ABC are the first three letters of the Latin script. ABC or abc may also refer to: Arts, entertainment and media Broadcasting * Aliw Broadcasting Corporation, Philippine broadcast company * American Broadcasting Company, a commercial American ...

's ''

20/20 Visual acuity (VA) commonly refers to the clarity of visual perception, vision, but technically rates an animal's ability to recognize small details with precision. Visual acuity depends on optical and neural factors. Optical factors of the eye ...

'' program, he admitted to running doping programs which have broken Olympic records. He said, "The whole history of the games is just full of corruption, cover-up, performance-enhancing drug use." In the interview he implicated five-time Olympic gold medalist

Marion Jones Marion Lois Jones (born October 12, 1975), also known as Marion Jones-Thompson, is an American former world champion track-and-field athlete and former professional basketball player. She won three gold medals and two bronze medals at the 2000 ...

and her partner

Tim Montgomery Timothy Montgomery (born January 28, 1975) is an American former track sprinter who specialized in the 100-meter dash. In 2005, he was stripped of his records—including a now-void men's 100-meter world record of 9.78 seconds set in 2002—a ...

Kelli White Kelli White (born April 1, 1977, in Oakland, California) is an American former sprinter. She won two gold medals in the World Championships in Paris in 2003. However, on June 18, 2004, she was stripped of her medals, because she tested positive ...

(who later admitted using performance-enhancing drugs), sprinter

Dwain Chambers Dwain Anthony Chambers (born 5 April 1978) is a British track and field, track Sprint (running), sprinter. He has won international medals at World and European levels and is one of the fastest European sprinters in the history of athletics (spo ...

NFL The National Football League (NFL) is a professional American football league in the United States. Composed of 32 teams, it is divided equally between the American Football Conference (AFC) and the National Football Conference (NFC). The N ...

linebacker

Bill Romanowski William Thomas Romanowski (born April 2, 1966) is an American former professional football player who was a linebacker for 16 seasons in the National Football League (NFL). Nicknamed "Romo" and "RomoCop", he spent the majority of his career wit ...

, and others. On December 21, 2006,

Yahoo Sports Yahoo! Sports is a sports news website launched by Yahoo! on December 8, 1997. It receives a majority of its information from Stats Perform. It employs numerous writers, and has team pages for teams in almost every North American major sport. ...

reported that one of Conte's initial defense lawyers, Troy Ellerman, had been targeted by the

FBI The Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) is the domestic Intelligence agency, intelligence and Security agency, security service of the United States and Federal law enforcement in the United States, its principal federal law enforcement ag ...

as a possible source of leaks to the media during the

Barry Bonds Barry Lamar Bonds (born July 24, 1964) is an American former professional baseball left fielder who played 22 seasons in Major League Baseball (MLB). Bonds was a member of the Pittsburgh Pirates from 1986 to 1992 and the San Francisco Giants f ...

probe. On February 14, 2007, Ellerman pleaded guilty to leaking grand jury testimony. It was also reported that FBI agents were an additional source of leaks. In May 2007, Conte claimed to be again providing supplements for Dwain Chambers, who left track and field to play in the

NFL Europa NFL Europe League (simply called NFL Europe and known in its final season as NFL Europa) was a professional American football league that functioned as the developmental minor league of the National Football League (NFL). Originally founded ...

league for the Hamburg Sea Devils before returning to athletics in 2008. According to Conte, the nutritional supplements provided via his company Scientific Nutrition for Advanced Conditioning, are perfectly legal. On December 13, 2007, Conte appeared on

CNN Cable News Network (CNN) is a multinational news organization operating, most notably, a website and a TV channel headquartered in Atlanta. Founded in 1980 by American media proprietor Ted Turner and Reese Schonfeld as a 24-hour cable ne ...

before '' The Mitchell Report'' was officially released.

Books

'' Game of Shadows: Barry Bonds, BALCO, and the Steroids Scandal that Rocked Professional Sports'' was published by two ''

San Francisco Chronicle The ''San Francisco Chronicle'' is a newspaper serving primarily the San Francisco Bay Area of Northern California. It was founded in 1865 as ''The Daily Dramatic Chronicle'' by teenage brothers Charles de Young and M. H. de Young, Michael H. ...

'' investigative reporters in 2006, relating to the case. There have been controversies about the informant and/or source of the information about the books and related court cases. In 2008, in the aftermath of the investigation, Conte wrote a book ''BALCO: The Straight Dope on Barry Bonds, Marion and What We Can Do to Save Sports'' which was co-written with author Nathan Jendrick. There was defamation litigation about the book's publication by boxer

Shane Mosley Shane Mosley (born September 7, 1971), often known by his nickname "Sugar" Shane Mosley, is an American former professional boxer who competed from 1993 to 2016. He held multiple triple champion, world championships in three weight classes, incl ...

which delayed the publication date. Mosley dropped the lawsuit, but not before

Skyhorse Publishing Skyhorse Publishing, Inc. is an American independent book publishing company founded in 2006 and headquartered in New York City, with a satellite office in Brattleboro, Vermont. History The current president and publisher is founder Tony Ly ...

had been scared away from publishing it. The book is officially unpublished as of 2017, but the unpublished manuscript has been made available.

Scientific Nutrition for Advanced Conditioning

In 2011, Conte started a new company, Scientific Nutrition for Advanced Conditioning (SNAC) which is based in

San Carlos, California San Carlos (Spanish language, Spanish for "St. Charles") is a city in San Mateo County, California, United States. The population is 30,722 per the 2020 United States census, 2020 census. History Native Americans Prior to the Spain, Spanis ...

, which in addition to nutritional supplements also offers boxing and sports training. One of SNAC's clients is boxer

Zab Judah Zabdiel Judah (born October 27, 1977) is an American former professional boxer who competed from 1996 to 2019. He held multiple world championships in two weight classes, including the undisputed championship at welterweight in 2005, and the ...

; Conte has previously worked with

Andre Berto Andre Michael Berto (born September 7, 1983) is a professional boxer who holds dual Haitian and American citizenship. A two-time former welterweight world champion, he held the World Boxing Council, WBC and International Boxing Federation, IBF t ...

Nonito Donaire Nonito Gonzales Donaire Jr. ( ; ; born November 16, 1982) is a Filipino American professional boxer. He has held multiple world championships in four weight classes, from flyweight to featherweight, and is the oldest boxer in history to win a ...

, and

Andre Ward Andre Michael Ward (born February 23, 1984) is an American former professional boxer who competed from 2004 to 2017. He retired with an undefeated record and held multiple world championships in two weight classes, including unified super ...

References

External links

Timeline of Scandal
by patch
ABC ''20/20'' interview with Victor Conte

2003 biography by BBC Sport

Scientific Nutrition for Advanced Conditioning
* {{DEFAULTSORT:Conte, Victor Living people 1950 births Sports controversies American jazz bass guitarists American male bass guitarists Tower of Power members American people of Italian descent American male jazz musicians American people convicted of money laundering American people convicted of drug offenses