Bonds jury deliberations stretch into 4th day
SAN FRANCISCO - Jury deliberations in the Barry Bonds perjury case have stretched well into their fourth day.
The eight women and four men on the panel returned to a federal courthouse in San Francisco just after 8:30 a.m. Pacific time Wednesday to continue their work. The panel has stayed behind closed doors since rehearing some testimony on Monday morning.
Bonds and his defense team waited for a verdict in a lawyers lounge at the courthouse.
The seven-time MVP is charged with three counts of lying to a grand jury in 2003 and one count of obstruction.
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Prosecutors allege that Bonds lied when he denied knowingly taking steroids and human growth hormone. A third count of making a false statement charges that Bonds lied when he said no one other than his doctor ever injected him with anything.
The fourth count is obstruction of justice, which alleges that MLB's all-time home runs leader hindered the grand jury's sports doping investigation by lying.
Bonds' case is the culmination of a federal investigation that began in 2002 into the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO), which distributed performance-enhancing drugs to athletes.
Ten people have been convicted in connection with the BALCO probe but only two, cyclist Tammy Thomas and track coach Trevor Graham, chose to push their cases to trial. The Bonds jury has deliberated longer than either of those panels, neither of which convicted the defendants on all counts. Thomas was convicted on four charges and acquitted on two. Graham, meanwhile, was convicted on one charge of lying to federal investigators but the jury could not reach a verdict on two other counts.
