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Clemens' day at Congress postponed

BY KAT O'BRIEN | kat.obrien@newsday.com

January 10, 2008

The Congressional committee that had called for a hearing with Roger Clemens and others next week postponed the meeting until Feb. 13 to allow for further investigation.

The scheduled Jan. 15 hearing that is to include Sen. George Mitchell (who authored the Mitchell Report on steroid use in baseball), commissioner Bud Selig and players association president Donald Fehr will go on as planned. But the Jan. 16 hearing, which Clemens had pledged to testify at, will be pushed back until Feb. 13. That date is after the sentencing for former Mets clubhouse attendant Kirk Radomski, who pleaded guilty to distributing steroids.

Committee on Oversight and Government Reform chairman Henry A. Waxman and Ranking Minority Member Tom Davis released a joint statement on the rescheduling: "The Oversight Committee will postpone the hearing until February 13, 2008, which is after the sentencing of Kirk Radomski. The witnesses to be invited to the rescheduled hearing are Brian McNamee, Kirk Radomski, Andy Pettitte, Chuck Knoblauch and Roger Clemens. In preparation for the hearing, we will ask each witness to provide the Committee with a deposition. Postponing the hearing will provide additional time to coordinate the Committee's investigation with the Justice Department's ongoing efforts."

Carl Tobias, a law professor at the University of Richmond, said by phone: "This will give them time to investigate further and to sort out various questions of immunity, and how that might play back on possible prosecutions. When you testify before Congress, you sometimes are given immunity."

Radomski and McNamee, a former assistant trainer with the Yankees, both claimed to have been involved in giving or selling steroids and human growth hormone to players. Clemens, Pettitte and Knoblauch were all named in the Mitchell Report.

Clemens has been furiously fighting the allegations. He appeared on "60 Minutes" Sunday night, denying he ever used steroids; filed a defamation lawsuit against his former personal trainer McNamee; and held a news conference in Houston Monday at which he promised to testify and answer all questions at next week's Congressional hearing.

Clemens' attorney, Rusty Hardin, said in a statement: "We're in contact with members of the staff and will work through the details of this change in plans with them. We are continuing to cooperate fully with the committee and Roger looks forward to one day testifying under oath in a public hearing."

Meanwhile, McNamee's lawyers were striking back at Clemens. Attorneys Earl Ward and Richard Emery did not return phone calls yesterday. However, a McNamee attorney said he wants immunity in order to testify.

Ward also said that McNamee wanted Congress to get and make public a recording of an interview of his client by two private investigators hired by Clemens. That interview took place Dec. 12, on the eve of the release of the Mitchell Report, in which McNamee accused Clemens of using steroids and HGH. The lawsuit filed by Clemens contains what is believed to be a portion of that interview.

"They should ask for the entire tape of the interview back in December," Ward said. "That's the tape they should ask for. According to Brian, they tried to get him to recant. Brian said, look, what I told the investigators was the truth."

Hardin said this week that the two investigators - Jim Yarbrough and Billy Belk - only went to meet with McNamee to find out what he had said about Clemens and Pettitte, not to get McNamee to change his story.

Today, McNamee will meet with BALCO prosecutors who are in New York for tomorrow's sentencing of former Olympic track star Marion Jones. "They want to talk to him while they're in town," Ward said, though he also said they expect only a brief meeting.

This story was supplemented with an Associated Press report.