Federal court keeps Barry Bonds’ case alive till July 22

A federal appeals court has granted a request by Barry Bonds’ prosecutors to keep his case alive until July 22 while the Justice Department decides whether to ask the U.S. Supreme Court to reinstate Bonds’ obstruction-of-justice conviction.

The Ninth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals issued the order Thursday. On April 22, that court voted 10-1 to overturn a jury verdict and clear Bonds, baseball’s all-time home run leader, of obstructing an investigation of steroid use in sports during his 2003 grand jury testimony.

The former San Francisco Giants star had been charged with perjury for denying he had ever knowingly used performance-enhancing drugs. The jury deadlocked on those charges, but convicted him in 2011 of obstructing justice with a rambling, nonresponsive answer to a prosecutor’s question about whether his trainer had ever given him injectable drugs.

The appeals court ruled that Bonds’ response was immaterial to the subject of the investigation and was not an attempt to impede it. U.S. Attorney Melinda Haag’s office, which prosecuted Bonds, said in a filing last week that the court had improperly second-guessed the jury’s conclusions, and asked the court to put the case on hold until July 22, the government’s deadline for filing a Supreme Court appeal. Bonds’ lawyers did not oppose the request.

http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Federal-court-keeps-Barry-Bonds-case-alive-6236966.php

It ain't over folks.