Giacomo Perini Stripped of Paralympic Bronze Medal

Italian rower Giacomo Perini was disqualified and stripped of his bronze medal at the Paralympics for having a mobile phone on his boat during the PR1 men’s single sculls final, despite his claims that he never used it to communicate. The Italian Rowing Federation's appeal was rejected, and Australian Erik Horrie was awarded the bronze medal. In a separate incident, Australian swimmer Ahmed Kelly was initially disqualified for performing butterfly instead of front crawl in the freestyle leg of the 150m medley SM3 event, but was reinstated after an appeal highlighted that the rules allow any stroke except backstroke or breaststroke. Kelly went on to win the silver medal. Additionally, Australian runner Jaryd Clifford was disqualified from the T13 5000m event for not being correctly tethered to his seeing-eye guide as he crossed the finish line, losing his bronze medal.