A federal grand jury indicted Major League Baseball career homerun leader Barry Bonds Thursday on four counts of perjury and a single count of obstruction of justice, charging that the slugger lied under oath when he claimed he never knowingly did steroids.
The 10-page indictment listed 19 separate statements Bond made under oath that the grand jury termed lies. According to the indictment Bonds tested positive for steroid use as early as December 2001, following the season he set an all-time, single-season homerun record with 73 round-trippers. “During the criminal investigation, evidence was obtained including positive tests for the presence of anabolic steroids and other performance enhancing substances for Bonds and other athletes," the indictment said.
Late Thursday night ABC News reported that the grand jury had obtained confidential drug testing records from MLB over the objection of Major League Baseball, inferring that those were the sources utilized by the grand jury to impeach Bonds’ testimony. Fox Sports, The Associated Press, ESPN and the San Francisco Chronicle all reported that Bonds could face as much as 30 years in prison if he is convicted of all five counts.
Bonds surpassed Hank Aaron, baseball’s all-time homerun leader, the first week of August when he hit his 756th career homerun. Bonds, who played for the San Francisco Giants for the last 15 years of his career, suddenly became a pure homerun power hitter during the 1999 season. The Giants issued a terse statement in the wake of the indictment.
"This is a very sad day. For many years, Barry Bonds was an important member of our team and is one of the most talented baseball players of his era. These are serious charges. Now that the judicial process has begun, we look forward to this matter being resolved in a court of law," the statement read.
Bonds attorney, John Burris, said he was surprised, telling The Associated Press he would notify Bonds. "I'm surprised," he said, "but there's been an effort to get Barry for a long time. I'm curious what evidence they have now they didn't have before."
Another Bonds defense attorney, Mike Rains, declined comment, asserting he hadn’t seen the indictment. “It goes without saying that we look forward to rebutting these unsupported charges in court," Rains said. "We will no doubt have more specific comments in the very near future once we have had the opportunity to actually see this indictment that took so long to generate."
The embattled slugger has been under intense scrutiny since two San Francisco Chronicle reporters published exclusive stories based on leaked grand jury testimony from a case involving a so-called supplements lab known as the Bay Area Laboratory Co-operative. A number of prominent baseball stars testified in the case, all receiving immunity as long as each told the truth.
The Giants cut their ties with Bonds at the end of the 2007 season. He is now a free agent. Bonds will appear in U.S. District Court in San Francisco Dec. 7.
