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Posted By: Jeff Lichtman

Cobby, your questions presume a lot. First, mere steroid use is not a crime. If hypothetically it was a crime, can I assume that I would labor under the real Federal Rules of Evidence? Would I ever agree to prosecute him for steroid use? Well, I'm a private criminal defense attorney and have never been a prosecutor. So, no, I wouldn't take the chance to prosecute him because while I despise him I don't think his transgressions rise to the level of such outrage that he needes to be criminally prosecuted for steroid use (though I might feel different if the crime was perjury before the Grand Jury). As for competent evidence, every person that has spoken to Bonds in which he has admitted crimes relating to his steroid use could come in and testify about those statements because the statements themselves would not be hearsay due to them being made against his penal interest and, therefore, would be more reliable. The documentary support would include calenders, etc., that illustrate Bonds's steroid regimen. There is a lot of that and a lot of people that have no axe to grind against Bonds who would testify about his steroid use. A defense lawyer would have to convince a jury that all of these disparate people somehow conspired together to destroy poor Barry. I've had luck with defenses like that on occasion...but those types of defenses are very tough to win when defending someone who most likely would not be deemed likeable by a jury.