Free at Last
Barry Bonds’s conviction for obstruction of justice was overturned yesterday by the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals. Assuming that either the feds aren’t crazy enough to appeal this to the Supreme Court or the Court isn’t dumb enough to take the case, this should be the end of it. This is, make no mistake, a good thing; the idea that giving a rambling answer instead of a direct one is a felony is idiotic. As Judge Alex Kozinski wrote in his opinion:
The most one can say about this statement is that it was non-responsive and thereby impeded the investigation to a small degree by wasting the grand jury’s time and trying the prosecutors’ patience.
Hopefully this will a step towards both Bonds’s re-entry into the world of baseball and reining in prosecutors who abuse their power in such blatant ways.
Contempt of court quite literally.Report
“Hopefully this will a step towards both Bonds’s re-entry into the world of baseball and reining in prosecutors who abuse their power in such blatant ways.”
If you believe that, I got a bridge in NY to sell ya.Report
the idea that giving a rambling answer instead of a direct one is a felony is idiotic.
Not quite.
In the federal system, there are three perjury statutes: 18 USC 1621-1623.
1621 is the ordinary perjury statute. 1622 is suborning perjury. I forget exactly what 1623 is called, but it deals with false oaths and statements (so does 18 USC 1001, and, arguably, 371, and a few others in specific contexts; e.g., 1519).
Functionally, the big difference between 1621 & 1623 is that 1621 requires proof of falsity, where 1623 does not. A prosecution can be sustained under 1623 where two statements are given where one rules out the possibility of the other.
CRS: PerjuryReport
Hopefully this will a step towards both Bonds’s re-entry into the world of baseball and reining in prosecutors who abuse their power in such blatant ways.
That’s as likely to happen as getting the sports purists types to live with the fact that performance enhancing drugs aren’t going away. It’s a joke that they’re illegal anyway.Report
I doubt he’ll make it to the Hall of Fame, sportswriters being what they are. But two springs ago Bonds worked as a batting instructor for the Giants, and now that the idiots can’t call him a felon anymore, that’s more likely to happen again.
And this past off-season Bonds worked with ARod on his swing. Admittedly, that was reported as ARod deliberately pissing off MLB by associating with the anti-Christ, but given that so far he’s hitting .265/.419/.571, maybe the idea that the best hitter of the past 40 years has something to contribute will get some traction.Report
Ok, good, you are serious. I more or less agree, but as you’re often dryer than the Atacama, I wasn’t entirely sure I was getting Poe’d.Report