A New Grand Jury Impaneled For Bonds

San Francisco Giants' Barry Bonds sits in the dugout during their game against the Milwaukee Brewers in San Francisco, Wednesday. (Benjamin Sklar - AP)

SAN FRANCISCO, July 20 -- Thursday brought the possibility of some measure of resolution to the Barry Bonds steroids saga, either an indictment by a federal grand jury on charges of perjury and/or tax evasion, or absolution. Instead, it brought neither, and the likelihood is the saga will go on for many more months.

The grand jury dissolved with no indictment, but a new one was impaneled. A key witness was released from the prison where he had been serving for refusing to testify, but was immediately served with a new subpoena.

And Bonds himself, when approached by reporters before the San Francisco Giants' game Thursday night at AT&T Park, exercised his right to remain silent, then took his customary place in left field at game time, showing no outward signs of the off-field turmoil. In the eighth inning, he matter-of-factly blasted home run No. 722 in his career, a towering drive to center. Business as usual.

"We have all heard the overworked adage that you can indict a ham sandwich," Michael Rains, Bonds's lawyer, said in a news conference Thursday morning. " . . . So what I say to the public is: if it were that easy, why don't they have an indictment? Why don't we? And the answer is: they don't even have enough [evidence] to indict a ham sandwich, let alone Barry Bonds."

U.S. Attorney Kevin V. Ryan, in a statement, explained the postponement of a decision on Bonds by saying: "Some unanswered questions remain in the case. We intend to pursue the answers to those questions. We will continue to move forward including continuing to seek the truthful testimony of witnesses whose testimony the grand jury is entitled to hear."

Those last words appeared to be a direct reference to Greg Anderson, Bonds's personal trainer, who is considered a key witness in the investigators' case against Bonds and who was released Thursday from a federal prison where he had spent the last two weeks for refusing to testify against Bonds.

Anderson's freedom, however, could be short-lived. His lawyer told reporters Thursday that Anderson has already been subpoenaed to testify before the new grand jury when it convenes on July 27, and the lawyer also said Anderson would again refuse.

Anderson was one of four men convicted in the federal case against the Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative (BALCO), the lab outside San Francisco that was found to be at the center of a steroids ring that distributed performance-enhancing drugs to top athletes.

During the BALCO investigation, Bonds, who turns 42 Monday, reportedly testified that he used substances, given to him by Anderson, that were later identified as steroids. However, Bonds reportedly said he did not know the substances were steroids.

The government's actions, in convening a new grand jury, can be viewed as an attempt to force Anderson -- apparently the key to the government's case for perjury charges against Bonds -- to testify, since this time his incarceration likely would be measured in months, instead of weeks. Grand juries are impaneled for up to 18 months.

"They can subpoena him every day for the rest of the year," Anderson's attorney, Mark Geragos, told the Associated Press, "and it doesn't matter. He's not going to testify."

Rains telephoned Bonds with the news of the government's non-action on Thursday morning, and said the news was met more with a sense of "temporary relief" than with joy.

"He is hoping that this is the end of it," Rains said. "But he doesn't know that. Nor do I . . . [The impaneling of a new grand jury] is a signal to me that this investigation may have crossed that line where the investigation becomes an inquisition. At some point in time, it has to end."