Bonds’ Trainer Is Facing More Time Behind Bars

Greg Anderson, Barry Bonds’ personal trainer, could be sent back to prison today, when a federal judge in San Francisco is expected to ask for the trainer’s testimony before a second grand jury weighing if the San Francisco Giants slugger committed perjury.

Anderson, 40, was behind bars from July 5 to July 20 for declining to testify to a prior federal grand jury whose term expired without an indictment being filed against Bonds by the U.S. Attorney’s office. Federal prosecutors are probing whether Bonds lied to a grand jury when he said he never knowingly used steroids. Bonds testified that he believed he was using “flaxseed oil” given to him by Anderson. The grand jury probe also reportedly is focused on whether Bonds paid taxes on the sale of hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of sports memorabilia.

Track coach Trevor Graham also is reportedly a subject of the same grand-jury probe.

After pleading guilty last year to charges of steroid distribution and money laundering for his role in the BALCO investigation that ensnared Bonds and several other athletes, Anderson served six months in confinement. Anderson’s attorney contends a condition of the plea bargain was that Anderson is no longer subject to cooperating in any related government cases, but prosecutors and the presiding judge disagree.

That plea bargain and leaked testimony from the BALCO grand-jury hearings published by the San Francisco Chronicle are sufficient grounds for Anderson to remain mum, his attorney said Wednesday. Anderson contends he has legitimate fears that any statements he’d make to a grand jury could become leaked to the public. “In light of the reporters being forced to disclose their sources, I don’t believe Greg can be forced to testify until that investigation is done,” said Mark Geragos, Anderson’s attorney.

On Tuesday, U.S. District Judge Jeffrey S. White ruled in San Francisco that Chronicle reporters Mark Fainaru-Wada and Lance Williams must reveal the source of the leaked testimony to a separate federal grand jury or be subject to a jail term based on contempt of court. The reporters maintain they will protect their sources, and plan to appeal White’s decision to the U.S. 9th Circuit Court of Appeals.

As that separate grand jury explores the leak issue and the possible criminal wrongdoing of perjury and obstruction of justice by either government officials, BALCO defendants or defense attorneys, U.S. District Judge William Alsup is capable of ordering Anderson imprisoned again.

Yet, the new grand jury convened to consider Bonds’ possible perjury subpoenaed Anderson the day he left prison last month, and Alsup can choose to keep a silent Anderson in prison throughout the current Bonds grand jury term -- which doesn’t expire for more than 16 months.

In a June court declaration released Wednesday, Anderson said, “I will not ever make statements about other people. That has always been my position and will continue to be.”

Paula Canny, an Anderson attorney and friend, told the Associated Press that New England Patriots quarterback Tom Brady is among a list of “10 or 20” other athletes that Anderson’s partially redacted grand jury subpoena lists as people the trainer should be prepared to answer questions about. Canny explained that federal investigators may have noted Brady after seizing Anderson’s telephone records.

Brady and Bonds attended Serra High in the Bay Area.

“I had only one brief phone conversation with Tom Brady regarding a potential future workout,” Anderson said in his June declaration. “I never had another phone conversation with him and never discussed it with anyone.”