Barry Bonds Trial Begins Today

8:16 AM:Former San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds has arrived at thefederal courthouse where his trial on perjury charges begins today,seven years after he told a grand jury he never knowingly tooksteroids.

Jury selection for his trial is scheduled to begin at 8:30 a.m. inthe court of U.S. District Judge Susan Illston at the Federal Buildingon Golden Gate Avenue in San Francisco.

The selection of the 12 jurors and four alternates will begin with the questioning of an initial pool of 50 prospective jurors.

The trial is expected to last several weeks.

Bonds, 46, is accused of four counts of false statements and onecount of obstruction of justice in testimony before a federal grandjury on Dec. 4, 2003.

The grand jury was investigating the sale of performance-enhancing drugs by the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative, or BALCO.

The former San Francisco Giants outfielder set Major LeagueBaseball's career home-run record of 762 during his last season withthe team in 2007. He hit the single-season record of 73 in 2001.

Bonds is the last of 11 defendants who were charged in federal courtin San Francisco with either illegal drug distribution or lying inconnection with BALCO probe.

Eight defendants - including two BALCO officials, a chemist andBonds' trainer, Greg Anderson - pleaded guilty to various charges.

Two others - cycling champion Tammy Thomas and Olympic track coachTrevor Graham - went to trial in Illston's court and were separatelyconvicted of lying to investigators or the grand jury.

The five counts against Bonds each carry a theoretical maximumsentence of 10 years in prison if he is convicted. But on similarcharges, Thomas and Graham were sentenced to six months and one year ofhome confinement, respectively.

7:28 AM: More than seven years after Barry Bonds tolda grand jury he never knowingly took steroids, the home-run champion isdue to go on trial in federal court in San Francisco Monday on perjurycharges.
Bonds, 46, is accused of four counts of false statements and onecount of obstruction of justice in Dec. 4, 2003, testimony before afederal grand jury investigating sports drug sales by the Bay AreaLaboratory Co-Operative, or BALCO.

His trial in the court of U.S. District Judge Susan Illston beginsMonday morning with jury selection and is expected to last three orfour weeks.

The former San Francisco Giants outfielder set Major LeagueBaseball's career home-run record of 762 during his last season withthe team in 2007. He hit the single-season record of 73 in 2001.

Bonds is the last of 11 defendants who were charged in federal courtin San Francisco with either illegal drug distribution or lying inconnection with BALCO probe.

Eight defendants - including two BALCO officials, a chemist andBonds' trainer, Greg Anderson - pleaded guilty to various charges.

Two others, cycling champion Tammy Thomas and Olympic track coachTrevor Graham, went to trial in Illston's court and were separatelyconvicted of lying to investigators or the grand jury.

The five counts against Bonds each carry a theoretical maximumsentence of 10 years in prison if he is convicted. But on similarcharges, Thomas and Graham were sentenced, respectively, to six monthsand one year of home confinement.

Bonds' four alleged lies to the grand jury were statements that henever knowingly took steroids from Anderson; never was injected by him;never knowingly took human growth hormone from him; and never tookanything other than vitamins from him before 2003.

When asked, "Did you ever take any steroids that he gave you?"

Bonds answered, "Not that I know of," according to the indictment.

The fifth count accuses Bonds of obstructing justice by givingtestimony that was allegedly "intentionally evasive, false andmisleading" in those and other statements.

The current charges, issued in February, are the fourth version ofan indictment originally filed by a federal grand jury on Nov. 15,2007.

Federal prosecutors from the U.S. attorney's office had hoped Anderson would be a key witness against Bonds.

But Anderson, a childhood friend of Bonds, has told Illston he willrefuse to testify. The trainer is due to appear before the judgeTuesday morning to say whether he will continue to refuse to take thestand. Prosecutors have asked Illston to order him imprisoned forcontempt of court for the duration of the trail if he declines totestify.

Without Anderson's testimony, prosecutors are planning an array ofother evidence to prove their allegation that Bonds had in fact takensteroids and therefore lied in his 2003 statements.

The evidence will include testimony from six baseball players whoare slated to tell the jury that Anderson gave themperformance-enhancing drugs, according to a prosecution witness list.

Illston has ruled that prosecutors can use that testimony to try toshow that Anderson had access to such drugs, had a plan fordistributing them, and told the players what the drugs were.
But she has said that prosecutors can't argue that the alleged factthat Anderson gave drugs to other athletes therefore shows that he gavethem to Bonds as well.

An ex-girlfriend, Kimberly Bell, is due to testify about physicalchanges in Bonds' body after he allegedly began taking steroids in thelate 1990s.

Prosecutors also want to play a tape of a secretly recordedconversation between Anderson and Bonds' former business manager, SteveHoskins, at the San Francisco Giants clubhouse in the spring of 2003.
In the tape, Anderson refers to having given injections to a personnamed "Barry" and to the use of an "undetectable" material that "workedat the Olympics."

Illston has tentatively ruled the tape can be used as evidence, butonly if prosecutors first prove that the substances mentioned byAnderson were illegal at the time periods referred to by the trainer.

The selection of the 12 jurors and four alternates will begin withthe questioning of an initial pool of 50 prospective jurors inIllston's Federal Building courtroom.

The candidates have already filled out an 18-page questionnaire withqueries such as whether they know any of the lawyers or witnesses inthe case; whether they know of Congressional hearings on the steroiduse by Major League Baseball players; and whether they have attended aGiants game in the past five years.

The aim is to get a group of 36 potential jurors after candidateswho are unable to serve have been dismissed, either because they may bebiased in favor of one side or the other, or for other reasons.

Prosecutors and defense lawyers will then take turns exercisingso-called peremptory challenges, in which they can dismiss jurycandidates without giving a reason.

Under court rules, prosecutors can use peremptory challenges todismiss a total of eight potential regular jurors and alternates, whilethe defense can dismiss 12.

That part of the process is done silently, and when it is over, thecourt will be left with 12 jurors and four alternates. The jurors willbe identified only by number and not by name.

If the selection goes quickly and smoothly, opening statements could begin as early as Tuesday morning.

Julia Cheever, Bay City News