CLEMENS ASKS COURT TO PURSUE SLANDER RAPS AGAINST MCNAMEE
by admin ~ March 23rd, 2009.
Brian McNamee faces perjury raps himself as 46-year-old pitcher Clemens appealed to the court not to dismiss the slander case he filed against McNamee. Clemens said that his former trainer might not be telling the truth since he testified to the federal investigators with the pressure that he will be immune from prosecution.
A perjury case hangs above Clemens head because he allegedly lied to the Congress in a hearing pertaining to his use of steroids. This was based on McNamee’s statement that he had injected Clemens with the said drugs. In other reports McNamee had produced a boxful of proof – syringe, vials and gauze pads – he says he used on Clemens. Lab tests results said the baseball star’s DNA was positive on the evidence.
From Bloomberg:
Ellison’s ruling “unwittingly gives prosecutors the power to grant absolute immunity to individuals who maliciously and falsely make public statements that accuse another of a crime,” Clemens’s lawyer Rusty Hardin said in the filing. “It effectively permits the government to try individuals in the court of public opinion and thereby destroy their reputation and livelihood regardless of whether the government ever intends to charge the person with a crime.”
A lawyer for McNamee, Richard Emery, said the request to reconsider was “an insult to the court.”
“It’s sort of like saying, ‘Please, Judge,’” Emery said in a telephone interview.
Clemens won seven Cy Young awards as his league’s best pitcher during his 24-year career, more than anyone in Major League Baseball history. He last pitched for the New York Yankees in 2007.
Clemens also appealed to the jurors that damages should be awarded if McNamee is proven guilty because he acted maliciously by trying to harm the player’s reputation.
Category: Anabolic Steroids | Tags: Brian McNamee, Keith Ellison, perjury, Richard Emery, Roger Clemens, steroids