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[Definitie:] "An ergogenic aid is any substance or phenomenon that enhances performance."
(Wilmore and Costill) 
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2 1 - 0 2 - 2 0 0 6 Police Bust 'Steroid Guru' In Canton
(CBS4) CANTON - A Canton man, known as the 'Steroid Guru', will be arraigned Tuesday on drug and weapons charges.
Federal and local investigators arrested 37-year-old Bruce Kneller, of 735 Randolph Street, and seized more than 100,000 suspected steroid pills, ten guns and other materials. Kneller will be charged in Stoughton District Court with possession with intent to distribute steroids, ten counts of unlawful possession of a firearm, unlawful possession of ammunition, and violating a Drug Free School Zone.
Kneller pleaded not guilty in Stoughton District Court Tuesday morning. Kneller is expected to make bail. Prosecutors say Kneller's writings on steroids and other performance-enhancing supplements are widely available online. The investigation was a joint venture by the U.S. Postal Inspectors, Massachusetts state police, the FDA and the Canton police department. Investigators allege Kneller was making the pills himself and then distributing them. 2 2 - 0 2 - 2 0 0 6 Arrest is called first in Web steroids ring
DA says drugs sold to bodybuilders
By Maria Cramer and Kathleen Burge CANTON -- In the kitchen of his nondescript Canton apartment, Bruce Kneller packaged tens of thousands of illegal steroid pills he then shipped to Internet customers around the country, Norfolk County prosecutors said yesterday. Federal and local authorities say they seized 100,000 suspected steroid tablets and 10 firearms from Kneller's home after his arrest on Friday -- the first raid in a two-year investigation into what authorities say is a nationwide steroid manufacturing and distributing ring that advertised discreetly on the Internet. Yesterday, Kneller, 37, stood quietly in a Stoughton District courtroom in a suit and black overcoat as a plea of not guilty was entered on his behalf to charges including drug possession with intent to distribute and 10 counts of unlawful possession of a firearm. Kneller, described by authorities as a former registered nurse and a self-employed import-export businessman, is accused of distributing the drugs to consumers who ordered them via e-mail and sent cash payments wrapped in aluminum foil to addresses in California. Authorities said the ring has made hundreds of thousands of dollars by marketing the drugs in gyms and on legitimate websites for bodybuilders. To build their case, federal authorities said, they ordered illegal steroids over the Internet from e-mail addresses linked to Kneller. Authorities said they are continuing to investigate. Officials said they do not know of any well-known athletes among customers. Two customers who were listed in court documents declined to talk about Kneller or his company. ''We do think there is a tremendous public safety issue attached to this," Norfolk District Attorney William R. Keating said yesterday. ''This case will provide, I think, a very rare opportunity to see just how these kinds of illegal Internet steroid distribution businesses work." Illegal steroids and other performance-enhancing drugs have made international headlines in big-time sports with baseball stars, including slugger Mark McGwire, testifying before Congress last year. Professional sports leagues have since instituted stricter drug testing policies. The investigation that led to Kneller's arrest also involves US postal inspectors, the federal Food and Drug Administration, and the Canton police. Kneller's lawyer denied the allegations, calling his client a family man with solid roots in the Canton area. ''He's born and raised here," said lawyer Edward Sharkansky. ''He's got family here. This is his home." Kneller's parents and his wife sat in the courtroom yesterday during the arraignment. They declined to speak to reporters afterward. In the basement of the courthouse, near the detention room, Kneller's mother comforted her daughter-in-law, her head against hers, one arm draped around her shoulder. Authorities said Kneller had not registered the weapons in Massachusetts. Keating said he does not believe the guns are connected to the alleged drug operation. Kneller is also charged with unlawful possession of ammunition, and drug possession near a school. Asked why thousands of suspected steroid pills were found in his client's home, Sharkansky said the answer would be fleshed out during trial. ''I don't have an explanation," he said. Kneller is accused of working for a drug operation that advertised itself as Red Star Laboratories, which customers could find by searching on the Internet. Customers were directed to an e-mail address that offered them price lists and products, typically $75 for a bottle of pills. To order, they used a second address. They were instructed to send money to one of six addresses in the San Diego area. Prosecutors said Kneller received steroid pills, including some growth hormones designed for farm animals, from as far away as China and possibly as close as New Jersey. He then repackaged the pills that included Anadrol, Polysteron, and Masteron; wrapped them in labels that advertised them as Red Star Laboratories products; and sent them to customers by mail, prosecutors said. They said it is possible that Kneller mixed compounds to make some of the steroid pills.
Kneller, who was sometimes described as a chemist in online publications, has been a frequent, opinionated contributor to bodybuilding websites, including Testosterone Nation and MuscleMag International, often discussing in technical detail the pros and cons of various steroids and diet supplements. He wrote colorfully, sometimes with abundant expletives, describing his passion for Harley-Davidson motorcycles, high-performance cars, bull mastiffs, and sex. But at Blue Hills Village, the quiet apartment complex on Randolph Street in Canton where Kneller lives, neighbors said he was a friendly, polite man who never bothered anyone and lived peacefully with his wife. Several were shocked to learn of the allegations against Kneller. ''My jaw just kind of dropped," said Lisa Miller, 34, who lives below Kneller's second floor apartment. ''It's scary. . . . I don't think it's really hit me yet." Kneller, who is not a bodybuilder but wrote once about his struggle to lose 25 pounds quickly, often used the pen name ''Brock Strasser" in online magazines. Those who know him from the world of bodybuilding supplements describe him as an intelligent writer who liked to provoke controversy. In a 1998 column for Testosterone Nation, the credit line described him as holding a degree in nursing and working at a biopharmaceutical company in Cambridge. The article said he had researched diet supplements for more than 10 years and worked in drug development for more than four years. Stephen Schmitz of Bedford met Kneller years ago when both worked at a biotech company. Yesterday, he said he was surprised to hear about the charges. ''I don't believe that the charges are true," he said. ''Bruce is a very bright guy." In October, the Washington Post paid a researcher to test diet supplements, including two made by Applied Lifescience Research Industries Inc., a Las Vegas company linked to another supplement company, Gaspari Nutrition in Neptune, N.J., for which Kneller was a consultant. After the Post reported that the researcher found steroids in the ALRI supplements, Kneller and an ALRI official responded in an open letter to the Post. ''None of the compounds we have developed and currently market are in current violation of any controlled substance act at either the federal or state level," they wrote. The company, however, stopped making the supplements. 2 2 - 0 2 - 2 0 0 6 ‘Guru’ boasted on ’Net of Chinese connection
Laura Crimaldi E-mail article View text version View most popular Just four months before his arrest on charges he was running a steroid distribution center that reached bodybuilders nationwide, the man prosecutors labeled the “steroid guru” boasted he traveled to China to handpick supplements. “Last year I was in China more than I was in the United States,” said Bruce Kneller during an Oct. 14, 2005, interview broadcast live on bodybuilding.com. In the interview, Kneller talks about how he travels to China with his wife, a Chinese national, to select his products. A registered nurse in Massachusetts from 1997 to 2000, Kneller was billed as a chemist during the broadcast. “What we are ordering and designing is what they are actually getting . . . The quality of the manufacturing plant is akin to something you’d find in the United States. You’d be surprised. In some of these Third World countries how dirty and unclean. It’s not what you really would expect from a plant that’s manufacturing pharmaceutical ingredients,” Kneller said.
Kneller was interviewed alongside Rich Gaspari of Gaspari Nutrition. A label for Oxavar, a pro-anabolic agent sold by New Jersey-based Gaspari Nutrition, was among the items seized by investigators searching Kneller’s Canton apartment.
Aside from working as a staff columnist for Muscular Development Magazine, Kneller also wrote for Muscle Media and Testosterone Magazine. His family declined comment yesterday at Stoughton District Court. 2 2 - 0 2 - 2 0 0 6 Bust reveals steroid lab
By Laura Crimaldi A bodybuilding guru who allegedly transformed his Canton apartment into what officials called the nation’s “largest underground steroid lab” was arraigned yesterday as a part of an ongoing probe into the Internet’s rampant steroid black market.
Bruce W. Kneller, 37, a former nurse and staff columnist for Muscular Development Magazine, is accused of manufacturing and processing thousands of shipments of anabolic steroids made from materials from as far away as China for customers from coast to coast, said Norfolk County District Attorney William R. Keating. Operating as Red Star Laboratories, Kneller tapped into an e-mail network of steroid-hungry bodybuilders who would shell out about $75 a bottle for pills of Winstrol, Dianabol, Equipoise, Anadrol and the erectile-dysfunction medicine Cialis, prosecutors said. The outfit even bragged in advertising that none of the 15,000 shipments handled by the operation had been intercepted in seven years, prosecutors said. “This whole veneer of respectability — calling themselves a lab, marketing themselves to bodybuilders and using the Internet — that poses the greatest danger,” said Keating. He said some of the materials seized were intended for heifers. A search of Kneller’s apartment allegedly uncovered more than 1,600 bottles of suspected steroid pills and Cialis — many of which were packaged in unmarked containers, 10 firearms including a .38-caliber Smith & Wesson revolver and Browning 12-gauge shotgun and Glock 9 mm semiautomatic handgun, Red Star Laboratory product labels, Chinese and U.S. currency, three Chinese swords and brass knuckles. Customers would e-mail Kneller at tweeked@keptprivate.com for a price list and then be put in contact with a second man in California for payment instructions. Payments were required to be made in cash wrapped in aluminum foil. Kneller shipped the items from a Randolph post office under fake return addresses, prosecutors said. U.S. Postal Inspector Stephen Dowd said this is the first arrest in a steroid ring which has ties to 18 states, including Massachusetts. Kneller was freed on $25,000 bail after his arraignment at Stoughton District Court. His defense attorney downplayed the charges. “This is what this case is about — it’s about misdemeanor steroid charges and firearms paperwork that are not up to date,” said defense attorney Edward Sharkansky.
2 3 - 0 2 - 2 0 0 6 Arrest turns attention to steroid dangers: Cache seized in Canton contained expired cow drugs
By L.E. CAMPENELLA
Officials said that when federal, state and local law enforcement agencies converged Friday on the Blue Hills Village condo complex in Canton where Kneller lives with his wife, a Chinese national, they found boxes of pills, syringes, liquids and powders that were used to cook low-grade, impure and dangerous steroids. Boxes of paraphernalia that law enforcement agents said filled Kneller’s condo contained expired, mislabeled and dangerous steroid substitutes like drugs for cows. Norfolk County District Attorney William R. Keating said the arrest should be a lesson to those who may be using illegal steroids. ‘‘People don’t know what they’re getting,’’ Keating said. ‘‘(Sellers) create an aura of being safe ... but they’re using ingredients that aren’t even meant for human beings.’’ ‘‘It is clear given the quantity that was involved, and given the amount of money that was involved, that he was a key figure,’’ said Keating. While executing a search warrant, law enforcement personnel found more than 100,000 pills, bottles, unmarked labels and syringes; 10 unlicensed firearms including handguns, rifles and two shotguns; confiscated $4,300 in cash and $1,000 in Chinese currency; and froze a Bank of America checking account with a balance of $363,300. Officials said Kneller is part of a larger network that originated in Los Angeles and that advertises on bodybuilding sites and in gyms under the auspices of a fictitious company called Red Star Labs. ‘‘That’s how they work; they had a veneer of respectability,’’ Keating said. The ring, officials said, uses Kneller’s credentials to sell $75 to $100 bottles of steroid pills and liquids to clients who had no idea that the ingredients, in some cases, were for animals. Keating said Kneller used unregulated and expired ingredients, possibly shipped from China, to make the product. Kneller, officials said, moved to Canton about two years ago. His parents live in Randolph, where he lived until moving to the condominium in Canton. The investigation into the organization is ongoing, officials said, and more arrests and charges could be filed. Kneller is expected to return to court in April for a pretrial hearing. Scrutiny of Kneller’s steroid business took a turn on Feb. 14 when 15 packages he tried to send from the Randolph post office were intercepted by investigators. Obtaining a search warrant, officials opened the shipment and found more than 6,300 steroids. The investigation into the cross-country ring began in 1998. 2 4 - 0 2 - 2 0 0 6 Steroid bust on Randolph Street
James Madden Kneller, a registered nurse, was part of what officials described as the biggest class E distribution ring in the entire country since 1998, and that this was the first major arrest made into this ring. "This is an unusual opportunity that tells people the danger of buying these inherently unsafe and unfair products online," Keating said. Kneller was arraigned Tuesday morning at Stoughton District Court for charges of possession with the intent to distribute class E drugs, 10 counts of unlawful possession of firearms, drug free zone violation (Keller’s apartment is across the street from Blue Hills Vocational Technical School), and unlawful possession of ammunition. According to the district attorney, Kneller does not have a previous criminal record but now is facing a maximum of 10 years in state prison for three counts of procession of large capacity firearms, two years minimum or 15 years maximum for drug-free zone violation, and two nine month misdemeanors for possession and distribution of class E drugs. Hours after his arraignment at 1 p.m., Keating held a press conference along with FDA Resident Agent in Charge Mark Dragonitti, Postal Inspector for Boston Stephen Dowd, and Detective Sgt. James Wolfe, to speak about the investigation and the dangers posed to steroid users that Kneller allegedly distributed to in at least a dozen states across the country. These states include North Dakota, Wisconsin, Michigan, New York, North Carolina, South Carolina, Kentucky, Idaho, Illinois, Kansas, and Texas, with the most focal states being California, New Jersey, and Massachusetts where authorities suspect most of the manufacturing occurred. "Completely blatant," was how Keating described Kneller’s selling technique to perspective steroid buyers via the Internet. It was in 2004 when Boston Postal Inspectors first received information from Federal Postal Inspector on Kneller. Before moving to Canton in 2005 Kneller lived in Randolph, and before that in Indiana. He had worked as a registered nurse and published articles extolling the benefits steroids, according to Keating. Articles were published on Web sites that had Internet links connecting to Kneller’s business. When Dowd was asked if Kneller could handle this operation on his own, the Boston Inspector replied, "yes." Keating said Kneller operated his business under the guise of Red Star Laboratories, a pseudo base of operation which officials said doesn’t exist, and told buyers to send cash only wrapped in aluminum foil to a California destination. According to Dowd, from various Web sites associated with steroids, some which Kneller posted his articles, Kneller posted the link tweeked@keptprivate.com, which listed various steroids and prices, and the link token@keptprivate.com, which was the purchasing link that connected directly to Kneller. "Concerns of ignorance," is what Keating said he has for people purchasing steroids online. The risks Keating claimed are not just the dangerous side effects of the steroids themselves, but also the ill gotten way in which Kneller allegedly made them. According to Keating, Kneller, who sold his various steroid products at $75 per bottle, advertised the steroids he were produced in a, "controlled and safe lab." But, when describing the inside of the apartment where Kneller made the steroids Dowd, Keating, and Dragonitti all described a scene that was anything but controlled and safe. Dragonitti said Kneller made steroids in the kitchen of his apartment, and that Kneller’s apartment was so disorganized, and there were so many unmarked chemicals and boxes filled with various steroids, officers were told not to move things around too much to prevent further disorganization. |
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