SAN FRANCISCO -- An appeals court ruled that federal agents were wrong to seize the infamous drug list and samples of 104 Major League Baseball players who allegedly tested positive for performance-enhancing drugs in 2003.
In a 9-2 vote, the 9th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals agreed on Wednesday with three lower court judges who chastised investigators who had a warrant for only 10 drug test results as part of the BALCO investigation into Barry Bonds and others.
The panel said federal agents trampled on players' protections against unreasonable searches and seizures.
Chief Judge Alex Kozinski said the players union had good reason to want to keep the list under wraps, citing leaks of players purportedly on the list.
• Baseball people react to ruling
"The risk to the players associated with disclosure, and with that the ability of the Players Association to obtain voluntary compliance with drug testing from its members in the future, is very high," the judge wrote. "Indeed, some players appear to have already suffered this very harm as a result of the government's seizure."
New York Yankees star Alex Rodriguez and Boston Red Sox slugger David Ortiz have acknowledged being on the list, and the New York Times has reported the Los Angeles Dodgers' Manny Ramirez and retired Sammy Sosa also can be found on it.
The government seized the samples and records in April 2004. The list of 104 players said to have tested positive, attached to a grand jury subpoena, has been part of a five-year legal fight, with the players union trying to force the government to return what federal agents took during raids.
"This was an obvious case of deliberate overreaching by the government in an effort to seize data as to which it lacked probable cause," Kozinski wrote.
He said the case was a significant test of the government's search and seizure powers in the digital age, and issued guidelines for investigators to follow in future raids that included submitting computers to independent computer experts for sorting of data.
U.S. attorney spokesman Jack Gillund in San Francisco said the government was reviewing its options, which could include an appeal to the U.S. Supreme Court.
Players association lawyer Elliot Peters said the union was happy with the ruling but still angry that names of several players allegedly on the list have been leaked to journalists.
"The leaks were crimes," Peters said. "The people who committed the crimes should be investigated and punished."
Peters declined to say whether he asked a federal judge to look into leaks from the list.
"If the government hadn't unconstitutionally seized this in the first place, there wouldn't have been any leaks," Peters said.
