SPOLITICAL: Perry: The Case Against the Case Against Barry Bonds

The great Dayn Perry with an overview…

Barry Bonds’ terminally looming jury trial has been postponed, perhaps until the fall. At some point, though, he’ll probably be dragged in front of his peers on four counts of perjury and one count of obstruction of justice. All of it, of course, traces back to the many-tentacled BALCO scandal, which has been too much with us for the better part of a decade. But it’s going to end soon, and this will almost certainly be the closing scene: Bonds’ walking out of the federal courthouse in San Francisco a free man.

Here’s why he’s going to do just that …

...The cases of Tammy Thomas and Trevor Graham are not instructive.

Much has been made of the fact that both BALCO defendants who chose not to plea out before trial have been found guilty–cyclist Tammy Thomas of perjury and obstruction and track coach Trevor Graham of lying to federal investigators. In both cases, however, the dealers in question testified that they supplied Thomas and Graham with drugs–something both defendants had previously denied. In Thomas’ case, it was chemist Patrick Arnold, and in Graham’s case it was Angel Heredia, a steroids dealer from Texas.

Again, it comes back to Greg Anderson. Since Anderson, Bonds’ alleged supplier, clearly won’t be testifying at Bonds’ perjury trial, the comparisons to Thomas and Arnold are flawed. In Bonds’ case–uniquely–there will be no dealer leveling a finger at him from the stand.

In the end, the only sensible expectation is that Bonds will be exonerated. Considering the wasted resources and zealous overreach on the part of the feds, it’s fitting that they, and not the target of their obsessions, will be the ones chastened by the verdict.