Jury selection for Bonds' trial to begin

When Barry Bonds walked into the federal courthouse in San Francisco on Dec. 4, 2003, he had hit 658 home runs, baseball had yet to institute drug testing with penalties and the Giants were 49 years removed from their last World Series title.

Much has changed since the brawny, contentious slugger spent 2 hours, 53 minutes answering questions from two assistant U.S. attorneys and grand jurors examining drug use in sports.

Baseball's Steroids Era receded somewhat as players and owners started mandatory testing, then toughened the rules three times. Bonds won his seventh MVP award in 2004 and broke Hank Aaron's career home run record in 2007.

Then on Nov. 15, 2007, Bonds was indicted on charges he lied to the grand jury when he denied knowingly using performance-enhancing drugs. Even though he wanted to continue playing, all 30 major league teams shunned him. And without Bonds, last year the Giants won their first title since 1954.

Starting tomorrow, a jury will be selected to determine whether he broke the law with four short answers: "Not that I know of," "No, no," "No," and "Right." Each charge -- four counts of making false statements to the grand jury and one of obstruction -- carries a possible sentence of up to 10 years, although federal guidelines make a total of 15 to 21 months more probable if Bonds is convicted.

His apparent defense? That he was truthful when he told the grand jury he didn't know the substances he used were steroids, so even if they were performance-enhancing drugs, that isn't relevant to the charges.

"If you look at the cases of athletes internationally over the years, the defenses have been, 'I didn't know,' " said Dr. Gary Wadler, former chairman of the committee that determines banned substances for the World Anti-Doping Agency. "They clearly know. The question is: In a hearing, can you prove it? But they know. Of course, they know."

Even if that is the case here, prosecutors may trouble convincing jurors. Much of the government's case has been gutted by Greg Anderson's refusal to testify. Bonds' personal trainer and childhood friend was sentenced in 2005 to three months in prison and three months' home confinement after pleading guilty to steroid distribution and money laundering for his role in the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO) case. Anderson is likely to be jailed again next week because he is refusing to testify at Bonds' trial.

Without Anderson to authenticate key evidence, U.S. District Judge Susan Illston ordered that prosecutors couldn't present three positive drug tests seized from BALCO and so-called doping calendars maintained by the trainer at the trial. Prosecutors failed to get her decision overturned. The appeal delayed the trial by two years, but the government lost in a 2-1 vote by a panel of the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals.