10 January 2023 , 15:11
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An apprentice jockey involved in the race in which rider Megan Taylor died in a fall has been charged with careless riding.
Racing officials in New Zealand have not named the rider but said a disciplinary panel hearing was being organised to hear the case.
Taylor, 26, was riding in a maiden race at the Ashburton race meeting in December when her mount Red Orchid came down when four horses fell on the bend.
Taylor was struck by another runner as she lay on the ground and was pronounced dead shortly after.
Three other riders Samantha Wynne, Tina Comignaghi and Diego Montes De Oca escaped serious injury but one of the horses involved in the incident, Show Us Plenty, was humanely euthanized with the rest of the meeting abandoned.
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Stewards conducted an investigation after the incident which has now been completed on behalf of the Racing integrity Board.
A statement said: “An apprentice jockey has been charged with careless riding as a result of a Racing Integrity Board investigation into Race 2 at the Ashburton thoroughbred race meeting on 15 December 2022.
“This is the race in which a horse ridden by apprentice jockey Megan Taylor fell, resulting in Megan’s death.
Apprentice jockey Taylor was in her third season of racing (megantaylor.equestrian/Instagram)“An adjudicative panel is in the process of being assigned to hear the charge.”
Taylor, who was also an apprentice, was in her third season of riding and had won 16 of her 236 starts in the saddle. Born in Canterbury on New Zealand’s south island, she spent two years working in Britain with New Zealand Olympians Tim and Jonelle Price.
The tragedy occurred just four months after Japanese born jockey Taiki Yanagida died from injuries suffered in a race fall at Cambridge in August.