Bullpen Melee Case Moving Forward

A hearing to determine whether two New York Yankees players will face charges for their roles in a bullpen brawl at Fenway Park during the American League Championship Series could be held sometime next month, law enforcement authorities say.

Police on Tuesday will ask a clerk-magistrate in the city's Roxbury District Court to schedule a show-cause hearing to determine whether there is probable cause to charge Yankees reliever Jeff Nelson and right fielder Karim Garcia with assault and battery, Suffolk district attorney's spokesman David Procopio said Monday.

"Boston police have conducted a very comprehensive investigation and moved slowly with good reason. We wanted to make sure we had the clearest picture of what occurred. At this point, the police and this office are confident that the next step should be the scheduling of a clerk's hearing," Procopio said.

Procopio said the hearing would probably be scheduled sometime in November.

Yankees general manager Brian Cashman had little to say about the case.

"It's still got to work its way out. It's a long way from being done," Cashman said.

Paul Williams, 24, of Derry, N.H., a part-time member of the Fenway Park grounds crew was treated and released from a hospital after a fracas with Nelson, Garcia and several other Yankees during the ninth inning of New York's 4-3 win over the Red Sox in the Oct. 11 game.

Williams apparently was cheering the Red Sox while working in the Yankees bullpen, Red Sox officials said.

Williams was treated at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center and was released wearing a neck brace.

"The family is glad that the police are moving forward," his father, Paul Williams Sr. of Londonderry, N.H., told WHDH-TV of Boston. "We have all the confidence in the Boston Police Department that they're making the right decisions."

Garcia and Nelson, interviewed in the visitors' clubhouse in Miami where the Yankees are taking on the Florida Marlins in the World Series, said they were unaware of the charges.

"I haven't heard anything," said Nelson.

"There's nothing to say. We'll see what happens and go from there," said Garcia.

Red Sox spokesman Kevin Shea said, "The last we heard, that matter was still under investigation. Boston police will handle it in the appropriate manner and best way they see fit and we have every confidence that they will."

MMIII The Associated Press. All Rights Reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed