Lawyer to plead guilty to leaking BALCO testimony

Prosecutors said a "previously unknown witness" approached the FBI and offered to help prove that Ellerman was the source. Larry McCormack, former executive director of the Pro Rodeo Hall of Fame and a private investigator who briefly worked for Conte, told the AP Thursday that he tipped off FBI agents.

McCormack said he shared a Sacramento office with Ellerman and that Fainaru-Wada visited there several times in 2004. McCormack said Ellerman told him about the leaks.

In February 2005, McCormack moved to Colorado Springs, Colo. to work for Ellerman, who then served as commissioner of the Professional Rodeo Cowboys Association.

The association's board of directors fired McCormack in August, but he said Ellerman tried to save his job and his decision to call federal investigators and expose the lawyer had nothing to do with his firing.

"My concerns were whether I could be in any kind of criminal jeopardy," said McCormack, a former Yuba County sheriff's deputy. "Another thing that was bothering me was that the government was spending all of this money on the investigations and these reporters are looking at going to prison -- it ate me alive."

Shortly after McCormack was fired, he said he wore an FBI wire and had a "heated conversation" with Ellerman in which the lawyer made incriminating statements. McCormack declined to discuss the details of that conversation.

San Francisco U.S. Attorney Kevin Ryan said the plea deal should end speculation that his office was a source of the leaks.

"I've maintained from the beginning that neither the agents nor the federal prosecutors involved in the BALCO case were the source of any grand jury leaks," he said.

Besides Conte and Valente, chemist Patrick Arnold, Bonds' personal trainer Greg Anderson, and track coach Remi Korchemny have all pleaded guilty in the BALCO probe. Korchemny and Valente were sentenced to probation and the others were each sentenced to jail terms no longer than four months.

Bonds has never been charged but suspicion continues to dog the San Francisco Giants slugger as he chases baseball's career home run record.

He told the grand jury he thought Anderson had given him flaxseed oil and arthritic balm, rather than the BALCO steroids known as "The Clear" and "The Cream." A federal grand jury is investigating him for possible perjury and obstruction of justice charges.