Tag: Roger Clemens

NYTimes:

Roger Clemens, whose hard throws intimidated even the toughest batters and turned him into one of the best pitchers in baseball history, was acquitted Monday of charges that he lied to Congress in 2008 when he insisted he never used steroids or human growth hormone during his remarkably lengthy career.

Much more to come from Jeralyn I am sure.

Update (TL): Clemens addresses the press here. Congrats to Rusty and the defense team. I think it's way past time for agent Jeff Novitsky to move on. How many millions did our government spend on Balco, Barry Bonds, and Roger Clemens? (And its investigation or Lance Armstrong which didn't result in criminal charges.)

Whoops. Yesterday Andrew Pettitte testified at Roger Clemens perjury trial that "Roger had mentioned to me that he had taken HGH."

Today, on cross-examination, he said he may have misheard Clemens.

Asked by Clemens' lawyer if it was fair to say it was "50-50" that Pettitte misunderstood the conversation from about a dozen years ago, Pettitte responded, "I'd say that's fair."

Isn't that exactly what Clemens told Congress -- that Pettitte "misremembers" their conversation?

Newsday reporter Jim Baumbach is in court and has a running account on Twitter of the testimony and objections. Baumbach writes the prosecutor didn't follow up on Pettitte's comment on redirect (which surprised the judge) and Clemens' lawyers will be filing a motion to strike Pettitte's testimony.

Update: Judge Walton ruled a re-trial is not barred. The double jeopardy bar is too high. He's angry at the Government, and may seek to have the Government pay Clemons' cost if there's a retrial, but he won't bar a retrial. The judge expects the defense to appeal his ruling. A new trial date has been set for April 17. Great tweeting by TJQuinnESPN.

Judge Walton is ruling now. Via TJQuin@ESPN.com:

Walton: and even if it was intentional, I don't think I can conclude that's sufficient that there is a double jeopardy bar.

And then:

Sounds like he's ready to rule trial may continue, but every sentence contradicts the last. Ups and downs are murder.

...Walton: if there's a retrial, he might see if he can force gov't to pay for #Clemens' wasted time from first trial.

...He's speaking as if he has already ruled: the trial may go on.

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The Government has filed its brief in support of a retrial of baseball giant Roger Clemens (available here.) They say their "inadvertent mistake" of failing to redact their trial exhibit of Congressman Cumming's testimony restating Laura Pettitte's statement about her husband's comments to her about a conversation with Clemens was not done for the purpose of goading the defense to request a mistrial.

They also claim they thought the trial was going well. As support, they include a blog post and a news article. I wonder if either author was in the courtroom for the trial.

Not explained: Why the prosecutor didn't stop the playing of the tape the minute he realized Laura Pettitte's statement was on it. All the Government says is, well, the defense didn't either. Considering the judge had just ruled days before Laura Pettitte's statements were inadmissible, the prosecutor should have stopped it immediately, knowing he was introducing banned material.

Also not addressed: The defense claim that they had repeatedly asked for the revised tape exhibits and the Government kept putting it off. [More...]

Baseball giant Roger Clemens has filed his motion with the Court asking for the charges against him to be dismissed permanently, and to prevent the Government, on double jeopardy grounds, from re-trying him after his mistrial a few weeks ago.

Clemens' lawyers argue the case fits squarely within the Supreme Court's decision in Oregon v. Kennedy, which holds a retrial is banned if the Government deliberately provoked the mistrial because it thought it wasn't doing well and wanted a do-over. They write:

[T]he best evidence of the Government’s intent was provided in real time on July 14, 2011. In the heat of the moment when the misconduct was raised in court, the Government did not suggest, much less offer any evidence to support a suggestion, that the prosecutor’s misconduct was unintentional. Nor did the Government rebut the reasonable inference that the misconduct was intended to provoke a mistrial. Instead, the explanation that the Government provided—that the Government’s conduct was somehow excused because the defense did not immediately object—is entirely consistent with a finding that the prosecutors intended to “goad” the defense into asking the Court to start the trial over from scratch.

[More...]

Here is the transcript of the final day of the Roger Clemens trial, which ended with a mistrial after the Government played a video and showed a transcript to the jury containing the very statements of Andrew Pettitte's wife Laura that only a week earlier, the Court had ruled inadmissible.

There was no snafu, no playing of the wrong tape, and no forgetting to edit or redact the tape and transcript. The Government acted deliberately. [More...]

Reading news reports of the mistrial declared in the Roger Clemens perjury trial, one is left wondering how did the Government not know what was in its own exhibit? As if some paralegal or tech person on the Government team failed to properly edit a videotape shown to the jury.

This was a case the Government not only knew was being closely watched by millions, but a case on which it had a team of prosecutors, backed by investigators, paralegals and technology experts to assist with exhibits. There was even an FBI agent, their lead agent, sitting at counsel table.

It strains credulity to suggest that prosecutors didn't review Clemons entire hearing testimony and carefully select the portions they thought would bring them the most bang for the buck, and then have a video prepared of those segments to introduce as an exhibit for the jury. [More...]

Baseball giant Roger Clemens appeared in court in D.C. today and pleaded not guilty to perjury, false statement and obstruction charges. The case boils down to:

Clemens flatly denied [to Congress]ever knowingly using banned substances, despite testimony to the contrary from former teammate Andy Pettitte and former assistant strength coach Brian McNamee.

As I've said before, this is a "he said/he said" case, proving he lied when he denied "knowingly" using steroids will be a problem, and the even bigger problem will be Congress' authority to have called him as a witness in the first place.

The furor over the Islamic Center continues, as protests were held in Manhattan by those on both sides. I still don't get the opposition to it, and why it's such a big deal. All that raw emotion and anger seems like it could be better spent on something positive.

Nor do I understand the anger over whether Roger Clemens took steroids, or why everyone seems to think that the word of a trainer who cut a deal and a former player who thinks he remembers an admission made in 1999 is grounds for a six count Indictment. Prosecuting the famous seems to be the new big thing.

Here's one view of a legal defense Clemons might have according to a former White House lawyer as reported in the New York Times: Congress may not have been authorized to call Clemons in the first place. [More...]