Berra Says He Shared Cocaine With 4 Pirates : Yankee Infielder Names Former Teammates Parker, Lacy, Milner, Scurry

New York Yankee infielder Dale Berra testified Monday that he shared cocaine with Dave Parker, John Milner, Lee Lacy and Rod Scurry when all five played baseball for the Pittsburgh Pirates and said his own drug use peaked last summer while he was injured.

“When I got hurt I got depressed and I had a lot of time on my hands for the first time in 10 years and I thought it was the opportune time to do it,” said Berra, the fourth major league player to testify at the cocaine distribution trial of Curtis Strong, 38, of Philadelphia.

Dodger infielder Enos Cabell testified earlier Monday that he snorted cocaine as many as 100 times between 1978 and 1984 and that he usually performed well, getting two or three hits, in games the day after using the drug.

Berra, son of Yogi Berra, the New York Yankee Hall of Famer, said he bought cocaine from Strong in 1982 when he met Strong in a Franklin Plaza suite, where Milner, Lacy, Willie Stargell and several coaches were assembled for a meal.

Strong came to the door and accompanied Parker, Milner, Lacy and himself to a side bedroom, Berra testified.

“I handed him $100, and he asked me what I wanted. He took (cocaine) from his pocket,” Berra said.

Berra never suggested that Stargell or the others were aware of the illegal sale.

Parker, now with Cincinnati, Milner, who is retired, and Lacy, now with Baltimore, are expected to testify later. Berra followed Lonnie Smith of the St. Louis Cardinals, Keith Hernandez of the New York Mets and Cabell, all of whom testified that they bought cocaine from Strong.

U.S. District Judge Gustave Diamond and a jury of nine women and three men are hearing Strong’s trial on charges that he sold cocaine to baseball players 16 times in Pittsburgh.

Berra said that between 1980 and 1982 he also bought cocaine from Jeffrey Mosco, 30, of Pittsburgh, Shelby Greer, 29, of Philadelphia, and Dale Shiffman, 33, of Pittsburgh.

Under questioning by defense attorney Adam O. Renfroe Jr., the Yankees’ reserve third baseman said he was also supplied with cocaine by former Pittsburgh Pirate mascot Kevin Koch. Koch, who has not been charged with any crime, resigned from the Pirates this year and denied any link with the cocaine investigation.

The government said Koch was wired by the FBI and that Shiffman agreed to sell cocaine in a transaction monitored by the FBI last November. The government said they would have called Koch if the Shiffman case had gone to trial.

Shiffman and two other men have pleaded guilty to drug charges in the same case. Mosco, Greer and another man are awaiting prosecution. Along with Strong, the seven men were indicted last May by a federal grand jury investigating cocaine dealing within major league baseball.

Berra also named two friends from New Jersey and a hotel bartender in Bradenton, Fla., where the Pirates train, as cocaine suppliers.

Berra said Strong was in the Pirates’ clubhouse at least once as a guest of Parker and Lacy.

He once saw Strong in the hallway near the team’s Three Rivers Stadium locker room and when he greeted Strong, “my manager, Chuck Tanner, said, ‘Don’t talk to that gentleman.’ ”

Diamond ordered the remark about Tanner stricken from the court record.

Berra said he first experienced euphoria and sharpened senses induced by cocaine at a New Year’s Eve party with friends in 1978. He said he has not used the drug since October, 1984.

The Yankees’ player said he also used it while with the Pirates’ Portland, Ore., farm team in July 1979.

“I got it from our clubhouse man” for $90 and used it with Scurry, Berra said.

Prosecutors have said that Scurry’s acknowledgement of a drug problem and his entry in a rehabilitation clinic prompted their investigation.

In 1980 during a trip to Puerto Rico, Berra said he asked Parker if he used cocaine, and Parker did not answer but later appeared at Berra’s hotel room with some of the white, powdered narcotic.

“Does this answer your question?” Berra quoted Parker as saying.

Cabell would not identify any other cocaine dealer, although he said he used cocaine many other times without obtaining it from Strong.

“He was my main supplier,” Cabell said, but added that he also bought it in bars.

Renfroe tried to portray Cabell as a highly paid player who is testifying against Strong only because he is fearful of losing his high-paying job if he doesn’t cooperate with federal prosecutors.

Cabell refused to name any other major league players as cocaine users other than those he named Friday: Parker; former Houston Astro pitcher J.R. Richard; San Francisco Giant outfielder Jeff Leonard and Angel pitcher Al Holland.

Cabell said he used cocaine “on and off,” generally in the evening after games, as he moved from the Astros to the Giants to the Detroit Tigers and back to the Astros from 1978 to 1984.

The player did not say whether he ever played a game while under the influence of cocaine.

Cabell admitted using cocaine with Richard, a former 20-game winner for the Astros, just before the pitcher suffered a stroke in 1980 that ended his career.

He did not specify how soon before the stroke he and Richard used cocaine, but admitted to snorting it with him in Houston and at the Astros’ spring training camp at Cocoa, Fla.

Cabell refused to speculate whether Richard’s stroke may have been triggered by cocaine. “I’m not a doctor,” he said.

Renfroe hinted that Cabell was interested in investing in a chain of food franchises that Strong would operate in major league cities.