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Bonds had advance warning for drug tests

THE ASSOCIATED PRESS

December 14, 2007

SAN FRANCISCO - Barry Bonds and his supporters often pointed to the fact that the home run king never flunked a drug test administered by Major League Baseball.

The Mitchell Report suggests why: it appears Bonds received advanced warning of two tests in 2003.

According to the report, Bonds was tested for steroid use on May 28 and June 4, 2003 as part of MLB's first attempt at formal detection. The report cites a San Francisco Chronicle report that it had obtained a tape recording of Bonds' personal trainer Greg Anderson boasting he received advanced notice of the testing.

Anderson purportedly said on the recording that he was told the 2003 testing would occur in late May or early June.

"Therefore," the report said, "if the report of this conversation is accurate Anderson correctly predicted the dates of testing, at least for his client Barry Bonds."

Former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell released the report yesterday, culminating a 20-month investigation into steroids in baseball. Bonds was mentioned 103 times in the 409-page report. Mitchell said Bonds, under investigation for perjury at the time, declined to talk.

Bonds was charged Nov. 15 with perjury and obstruction of justice related to that December 2003 testimony before a federal grand jury. But in the report, Mitchell said San Francisco Giants owner Peter Magowan told him that he asked Bonds in February 2004 if he took steroids.

"According to Magowan," Mitchell wrote, " ... To emphasize that he was not hiding anything Bonds added that he used these substances in the clubhouse in the plain view of others." . Two days after interviewing Magowan, Mitchell said lawyers for the Giants owner called investigators on his staff and "explained that his client misspoke when he said that Bonds had said, during their February 2004 telephone call, that he later learned the substances he had taken were steroids," Mitchell wrote. "According to his lawyer, Magowan could only recall with certainty that (1) Bonds had said he did not knowingly take steroids, and (2) what Bonds said to Magowan during the call was consistent with what Magowan later read in the San Francisco Chronicle about Bonds' reported grand jury testimony."

At least two members of Bonds' inner circle talked with Mitchell, including Harvey Shields, another of the slugger's personal trainers. Shields' interview with Mitchell appears to be consistent with Bonds' grand jury testimony that he thought he was taking legal supplements that were purchased over-the-counter rather than powerful steroids that are legal only with a doctor's prescription.