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Steroids in the News /
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Lawyer admits leaking U.S. steroid case testimony
Lawyer admits leaking U.S. steroid case testimony, By: Adam Tanner
February 14, 2007
SAN FRANCISCO (Reuters) - A lawyer representing the BALCO lab at the center of a global steroid scandal admitted on Wednesday to leaking grand jury transcripts that embarrassed baseball superstar Barry Bonds and other sports stars.
The guilty plea to two counts of contempt of court by Sacramento-based attorney Troy Ellerman removes the threat of imprisonment for two San Francisco Chronicle reporters who published details of the testimony but refused to make public their source.
Ellerman, who represented BALCO vice president Jim Valente, also pleaded guilty to a count of obstructing justice and a count of filing a false declaration.
BALCO was a San Francisco-area nutritional laboratory found to have distributed a previously undetectable steroid and other performance-enhancing drugs. Athletes including Bonds and track and field star Marion Jones testified before the grand jury during the investigation of the case.
In September, a federal judge said reporters Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams should go to jail for not revealing their source, but held off from implementing the ruling pending an appeals court review.
The case was one in a series nationwide in which federal prosecutors tried to force journalists to reveal their confidential sources or face time behind bars. Unauthorized distribution of grand jury transcripts is a crime.
"The government believes that Ellerman's guilty pleas will alleviate the need for the reporters to testify before the grand jury," the U.S. Attorney's office in Los Angeles said in a statement. "The withdrawal of the subpoenas is expected to moot Judge (Jeffrey) White's previous decision to hold the reporters in contempt."
In his plea agreement, Ellerman, 44, admitted that he allowed the two reporters to come to his office in June and November 2004 to copy notes from the closed-door grand jury testimony from track and field star Tim Montgomery, as well as baseball players Bonds, Jason Giambi and Gary Sheffield.
Before the judge trying the BALCO case however, Ellerman had already been complaining reports such as those published in the Chronicle could unfairly prejudge the case against the BALCO defendants.
"If they are denied a fair trial, which is due process, it is partly responsible to all these innuendoes, all these rumors, all this prejudging of the evidence before it's ever presented," he said in 2004.
Under the plea deal, Ellerman could face up to two years in prison -- more time than any of those convicted in the BALCO case received.
"I find the fact that Troy Ellerman has admitted to leaking the BALCO grand jury transcripts to be outrageous," BALCO head Victor Conte, who served jail time after his conviction, said in an e-mail. "This man was an officer of the court who was highly paid to provide the services of a criminal defense attorney."
"Instead, he chose to serve his own agenda and act in a way that was tremendously damaging to his own clients."
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