Decision on Jones issue soon: IOC

Jones was stripped of the 100, 200 and 4x400 metres relay gold medals and her long jump and 4x100 bronzes in 2007 after admitting to doping and being jailed for six months for lying to federal agents.

So far none of the other athletes in those events have been upgraded as is usually the case.

An appeal by several of Jones' relay team-mates, who were also stripped of their medals because of her doping, is pending at the Court of Arbitration for Sport, delaying a resolution of the Jones case.  IOC Vice-President Thomas Bach said while the relay case was to be ruled on by CAS on December 18, a decision on some of the other medals could come earlier.

"We still have a CAS case pending and CAS extended its deadline for a decision until Dec 18," Bach, head of the IOC juridical commission said.

"Now that this is dragging on, we decided to look at it case by case. In the coming weeks you may hear some developments," he said. "We will decide on cases where we do not expect any new information," Bach told reporters. The IOC is facing a dilemma whether to award Greece's Katerina Thanou the 100 gold from Sydney after she was banned for anti-doping rule violations at the 2004 Athens Games and was barred from competing in last year's Beijing Olympics for bringing the movement into disrepute.
Asked whether Thanou's upgrade was one of the cases that could be decided on soon, Bach only smiled.  "That is a very good question," he said.