Prof. Rory Little Weighs in on Bonds Case
UC Hastings Professor Rory Little commented twice recently on the Barry Bonds perjury case, which got under way this week at the United States Court in San Francisco.
Little remarked first on whether the prosecution in the Bonds case is overmatched, according to an article published Sunday in the New York Times.
Bonds was scheduled to appear in court on Monday. He will be tried on charges that he lied to a federal grand jury in 2003 when he testified that he had never knowingly used steroids.
According to legal experts, Bonds has spent over $1 million dollars on his defense and has seven lawyers. Three-Allen Roby, Cris Arguedas and Dennis Riordian-are considered some of the nation's best, and will likely sit with him at the defense table during the trial.
The prosecuting attorneys-Matthew Parrella and Jeffrey Nedrow-come to the table with less money and celebrity trial experience, says Little, a former federal prosecutor who worked in San Francisco when Nedrow was there.
"But they are not overmatched in two areas: their familiarity with the criminal justice system and the evidence," Little says. "You can fool a jury for one day, but you can't fool them for two weeks if the other side has the evidence to prove its case."
Read the full article in the New York Times.
Little has also commented on how Bonds's trainer risks more than just jail time if he chooses not to testify.
Trainer Greg Anderson, a childhood friend of Bonds, was expected to reaffirm in court today that he will not testify in Bonds's trial. Anderson has already spent more than a year in jail or prison for refusing to testify in the case. The prediction is that, once again, he will be ordered to jail, this time for the duration of the trial, which may last up to four weeks.
If Anderson refuses to testify this time, he may face his most serious charge yet, that of obstruction of justice. This charge carries a maximum prison sentence of 10 years.
"I have absolute confidence that Greg Anderson will be charged with obstruction of justice when the Bonds trial is over," Little said. "It's very uncommon to have someone who is willing to go to jail for months for no direct promise of payback from the defendant. And the government doesn't take intentional obstruction of justice lightly."
Little said the refusal to testify was a common practice in organized crime in the 1960s. "It became part of the culture, that omertà," Little said. "But then the government decided to use wire taps, so that phenomena came to an end. Now you really don't see it very often."