IOC president Jacques Rogge has set up a disciplinary commission to look into the claims made by Victor Conte, founder of BALCO, a California-based lab that allegedly provided drugs to elite athletes such as Jones.
"The allegations made by Mr. Conte are extremely serious and the IOC is fully committed to bringing to light any elements that will help the truth prevail," the IOC said in a statement.
Conte told ABC's 20/20 in a broadcast aired last Friday that he gave Jones performance-enhancing drugs before and after the Sydney Olympics. He also said he watched as Jones injected herself with human growth hormone.
U.S. track star Marion Jones could be stripped of her five Olympic medals from the 2000 Sydney Games. (AP Photo)
"After I instructed her how to do it and dialed it up, she did the injection with me sitting right there next to her, right in front of me," Conte told ABC.
Conte claimed he gave her a substance called "the clear," later determined to be tetrahydrogestrinone (THG), the endurance-boosting drug EPO and insulin. He also showed her how to inject growth hormone into her leg.
Jones won three gold (100 metres, 200 metres and 1,600-metre relay) and two bronze medals (long jump and 400-metre relay) in Sydney. She has repeatedly denied using drugs and has never failed a doping test, but Conte countered by saying no accurate tests existed for the substances he gave her during their 13-month working relationship.
Last week, Rogge said it was too soon to say if the IOC would strip Jones of her medals if Conte's allegations are true. It would be up to the IOC executive board to decide to take any action against the track and field athlete.
"I hope the truth will emerge," Rogge said. "We want the truth. We want to know what happened and the more we know, the better."
World Anti-Doping Agency chairman Dick Pound, a senior IOC member from Montreal, said Jones' Sydney medals should be stripped if Conte is telling the truth.
"The Games in Athens had zero tolerance and now we want to make sure that somebody didn't come here and get away with a result they shouldn't have," Pound said.
The U.S. Olympic Committee also threw its support behind the IOC initiative.
"There is no room in Olympic sports for the use of banned and illegal substances," USOC spokesman Darryl Seibel said. "If an investigation by the IOC will bring an end to speculation or allegations involving any athlete, that will be helpful."
Complicating matters is the IOC's rule on statute of limitations.
Under the IOC charter, Olympic decisions can only be challenged within three years of the Games' closing ceremony. The Sydney Olympics ended on Oct. 1, 2000, more than four years ago.
Pound counters by arguing that the IOC's three-year statute of limitations wouldn't apply in Jones' case because the allegations are just surfacing now.
"We will find a way to deal with that," Pound said. "It's arguable there was no decision taken, just a list of results. So you're not challenging a decision."
Germany's Thomas Bach, an IOC member who heads the three-member investigative panel, agrees with Pound.
"I don't think [the three-year rule] plays a role," he told The Associated Press on Tuesday.
Bach said he will request a transcript of the ABC program and that the investigation could cover athletes other than Jones mentioned in the program.
Bach also said he doesn't expect to finish the investigation before the next IOC board meeting, scheduled for Feb. 10-11 in Turin, Italy.
Jones is currently under investigation by the U.S. Anti-Doping Agency for alleged doping violations.
In July, Jones's former husband, C.J. Hunter, told federal investigators that the athlete was using banned performance-enhancing drugs during the 2000 Games. Insulin, THG and EPO were among the substances Hunter alleged that Jones used before, during and after the Olympics.
Conte is the subject of a grand jury investigation into steroid trafficking, allegedly providing banned substances to some of the world's biggest sports stars.
He faces charges in which BALCO is accused of concocting the designer steroid THG that, until recently, defied testing.
Track and field athletes charged with doping violations as a result of the BALCO investigation include Tim Montgomery, holder of the world record in the 100-metre sprint, Michelle Collins, Dwain Chambers, Chryste Gaines, Alvin Harrison, Kevin Toth and Kelli White.
with files from Associated Press
