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New grand jury to take up Bonds' case

San Francisco Giants slugger Barry Bonds prepares to take batting practice before a baseball game against the San Diego Padres on Friday in San Francisco. PHOTO: AP

With Barry Bonds still firmly in the sights of a federal steroid investigation, prosecutors will impanel a new grand jury to take up where an outgoing one left off on Thursday and consider perjury and tax-evasion charges against the baseball star.

"We are not finished," US Attorney Kevin Ryan said. "We have postponed the decision [to indict] for another day in light of some recent developments."

He declined to comment further on the case.

Word that a Bonds indictment was not imminent came as one grand jury's term expired, but the lawyer for Bonds' personal trainer Greg Anderson said his client has already been subpoenaed to testify next week before a new grand jury that will take up the case.

The new panel will continue to investigate whether Bonds lied under oath when he said he never knowingly took performance-enhancing drugs, attorney Mark Geragos said.

"They don't even have enough to indict a ham sandwich, let alone Barry Bonds," said the slugger's lawyer, Michael Rains.

But he seemed to back away slightly from Bonds' earlier statements that he didn't know the substances given to him by personal trainer Greg Anderson were steroids.

"He was suspicious in light of what he had read as to whether those were steroids or not," Rains told reporters outside the federal courthouse here.

Bonds arrived at AT&T Park to play for the San Francisco Giants around 4pm with his 16-year-old batboy son. As reporters moved toward his locker, team spokesman Blake Rhodes said Bonds would have no comment.

Anderson, a key witness, was freed on Thursday from the federal prison where he was sent more than two weeks ago after refusing to testify against his childhood friend.

Geragos, Anderson's lawyer, said the personal trainer already has been ordered to testify next Thursday before the new grand jury. But he again will refuse.

"They can subpoena him every day for the rest of this year, and it doesn't matter," Geragos said. "He's not going to talk."

The judge who ordered Anderson to prison on July 5 had said the personal trainer was to be held until he agreed to testify against Bonds or the grand jury's term expired.

Joseph Russienello, the US Attorney in San Francisco from 1982 to 1990, said handing the case off to a new grand jury means the federal government can lock up Anderson for the length of the new grand jury's term, which could extend beyond a year.
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