Former jockey Jamie Osborne was dramatically recalled to an Old Bailey witness box today to answer defence allegations that he took a £20,000 bribe.
He laughed when defence counsel Richard Ferguson, QC, suggested that he not only took the money but that he asked for an extra £10,000 to throw two races at the Cheltenham Festival in 1988.
But soon Osborne, now a trainer, could not conceal his anger as he became embroiled in a war of words with the barrister who is representing Robert Harrington, a man accused of corruption and obtaining £500 by deception.
He repeatedly told Judge David Paget that the allegation was a "fairy tale" and a "figment of someone's imagination".
He said: "This is absolute rubbish. It is a fragment of someone's imagination. My Lord, can he make these allegations without any substance?"
Judge Paget replied: "Mr Osborne, I can understand your frustration. The short answer is yes. It is not Mr Ferguson's fault. He has taken instructions."
Osborne, 32, last week told the jury that a childhood hero, jockey Dermot Browne, had offered him £20,000 to make sure the two favourites he was riding did not win at the Cheltenham Festival.
He said he had been in need of the money but had turned it down. He had never been involved in fixing races.
Lambourn-based Osborne was recalled today on the request of the defence following the statement.
Harrington, 58, a former Thames Valley detective working as a private investigator, has pleaded not guilty to deception and to corruptly soliciting £2,000 from Osborne on the pretext of influencing a police investigation.
Osborne told the court he was arrested as part of a police investigation into horse doping and race fixing in 1998, but no charges were brought against him.
While on police bail, he alleged Harrington approached him for money saying he could bribe a policeman. He went to Scotland Yard and agreed to act undercover with officers investigating Harrington.
Osborne told the jury today that the suggestion that he took the money and also asked for another £10,000 was: "categorically not true".
Mr Ferguson persisted: "I suggest what happened was this, that you received a phone call offering you £20,000 and your initial reaction was that you would think about it and thereafter, you indicated you would do it and you wanted an extra £10,000."
Osborne replied raising his voice: "Mr Ferguson, this is a fairy tale and I am absolutely fed up with it.
"I am not on trial here. This just didn't happen. You are trying to mislead everybody. I have given my evidence on oath."
Mr Ferguson continued: "I can suggest the circumstances and the manner in which the money was paid to you.
"There was a meeting between Lambourn village and Great Shefford, in a lay-by.
"You were in a car and the man who was paying you the money was in a car, both driving towards each other with the driver's windows open. When side by side, the money was passed from the other car to you."
Osborne: "Mr Ferguson, you are trying to mislead. There are wider implications for me because it reaches a wider audience.
"This will be reported in the papers. There is absolutely no truth in it and I am absolutely defenceless.
"You probably have heard that the person I named last week was on the telephone the next day to the Press, making allegations and telling them I took the money, which is absolutely untrue.
"I assume you have been in touch with him and he has made these allegations which are absolute nonsense."
Mr Ferguson went on: "At the Cheltenham Festival on St Patrick's Day at the Cathcart Challenge Cup, you were on the favourite Raise An Argument. The horse was pulled up.
"In a later race, you rode the joint favourite which finished way down the field. These were the two races for which you received money."
Osborne: "I didn't receive money. They were two races where I was asked to stop the horses.
"What I cannot get across to you was that I was 19, a year out of school, and to ride a winner in the Cheltenham Festival was an achievement. It was comic-book stuff.
"The thought of throwing the chance of that for money would never have entered my head."
Osborne told the court last week that he only pulled up horses during races to avoid undue distress when they did not have a chance of winning. He said: 'I have never taken part in a bent race.'
