July 20 , 2006

Barry Bonds, who has hit the second- most home runs in Major League Baseball history, won't be named in an indictment today by a grand jury investigating steroid use in professional sports.

Bonds has denied using muscle-building steroids. His lawyer Laura Enos said July 15 she was ``cautiously hopeful'' the ballplayer wouldn't be charged as part of the federal probe, after the Associated Press reported his legal team was preparing for an indictment.

The government ``is not seeking an indictment today'' and the investigation is continuing, U.S. Attorney's Office spokesman Luke Macaulay said in a statement.

``Any day if you're representing the target or subject of a grand jury investigation and your client's not indicted, it's a good day,'' said Andrew Weissmann, a former U.S. Justice Department prosecutor now a New York partner at Jenner & Block. ``Unfortunately it doesn't mean a lot for tomorrow.''

Bonds told a grand jury he might have unknowingly used substances that contained the drugs, according to the San Francisco Chronicle. Slowed by injuries over the past two years, Bonds said he thought the substances were flax seed oil and a legal ointment, the paper said.

Enos said the government shouldn't indict her client because it has no case against him.

``When you haven't heard, you've heard,'' the lawyer said. ``They don't have it, honey. They don't have it.''

Steroid Abuse

Allegations of steroid abuse by athletes have led to congressional scrutiny, testing in high schools and tougher league penalties. They have also raised questions about the validity of some sports records, especially Bonds's. Two months ago, he hit his 715th big-league career home run, passing Babe Ruth. He now has 721, 34 short of Hank Aaron's record.

Greg Anderson, Bonds's personal trainer, admitted to conspiring with Victor Conte, founder of the Bay Area Cooperative Laboratory in California, or Balco, to distribute testosterone cream, human growth hormone and steroids to unnamed athletes.

The government ``will continue to move forward actively in this investigation, including continuing to seek the truthful testimony of witnesses whose testimony the grand jury is entitled to hear,'' the statement said.

The Balco investigation has yielded five felony convictions and has ``galvanized the national debate on the surprisingly widespread and dangerous and harmful nature of anabolic steroids and performance enhancing drugs in sports,'' the statement said.

Since the start of the investigation, the U.S. sentencing commission toughened guidelines for steroids-related offenses and Major League Baseball has strengthened its steroids testing program, the government said.