President Bush urged to ignore Jones's request for sentence commutations

WASHINGTON, July 22 (Xinhua) -- The USA Track and Field urged President George W. Bush on Tuesday to ignore former player Marion Lois Jones's request for sentence commutations.

"She lied to federal agents... She admitted it," Douglas Logan, the newly-sworn chief executive of USA Track and Field, said in an open letter the president. "And now she apparently wants to be let off."

Logan posted the letter after he read news reports saying that Jones has applied for presidential pardons for her perjury sentence.

The U.S. track star, who won five medals at the 2000 Summer Olympic Games in Sydney, Australia, has been stripped of all medal dating back to September 2000 after she was convicted of lying about her use of performance-enhancing drugs and sentenced to six months in jail in January.

"As the new CEO of USA Track and Field, I have a moral and practical duty to make the case against her request," said Logan, who has vowed to make the fight against doping his top priority.

Logan noted that pardon for Jones would be a "horrible message" to young American athletes and fans as well as the international audience who saw Jones perform at the Sydney Games.

"To pardon one of the biggest frauds perpetuated on the Olympic movement would be nothing less than thumbing our collective noses at the world," he said.