The federal authorities looking into the case of Roger Clemens were able to find traces of performance enhancing drugs on the paraphernalia that his former trainer claimed to use to inject him with.

This discovery could fire up the claim of Brian McNamee after saying that he used different items such as vials, syringes, and gauze pads to inoculate Roger Clemens with different steroids and human growth hormone.

The International Herald Tribune reported that in February, federal prosecutors had confirmed that they were able to link the DNA of Clemens to the blood residue found in at least one of the syringes that was turned over by McNamee to the authorities.

On the other hand, Clemens for his part never denied the allegation that McNamee had indeed injected him. The athlete claimed though that the substances he knew he was being given were made up of Vitamin B12 and painkiller, lidocaine.

As part of the investigation into whether Clemens had actually committed perjury after telling the Congress last year that he never took any performance enhancing drugs, the United States Attorney’s Office for the District of Columbia had called together a grand jury to look into the case.

Just in case the federal prosecutors accused Clemens and looked at the evidence found on the drug paraphernalia, Clemens’ legal counsel is posied to make a move to question the validity of the specimens as well as the chain of custody.

Rusty Hardin, who is Clemens’s lead lawyer, was quoted as having said on Monday night that he was not at all surprised that performance-enhancing substances were obtained. He even uttered the word “duh’ in exaggeration. He asked if it is really possible for McNamee to make up all of these accusations without having “evidence” to back up his outrageous claims. Hardin added that the truth is Roger never used steroids or any H.G.H.

When Brian McNamee handed over the paraphernalia into the custody of the federal authorities in January 2008, he confessed that he had kept all the materials within a Federal Express box located at his basement ever since he had used them to inject Clemens from the year 2000 and 2001.

In order to find out the truth, tests were conducted on the materials at the Los Angeles-area laboratory of Dr. Don Catlin. But until now, it remains unapparent to which drug paraphernalia the performance-enhancing substances were found. Those individuals who were briefed on the investigation gave ambiguous statement since they did not wish to divulge sensitive information which may compromise the case.

In 2007, Brian McNamee was finally compelled by the federal authorities to collaborate with George J. Mitchell, who was at that time is heading an investigation about the use of performance-enhancing drugs in the world of baseball. In return, McNamee was assured by the authorities that he will never be charged for steroid distribution.

On the other hand, when Mitchell issued his report in December 2007, he said that Clemens, together with his two Yankees teammates — Chuck Knoblauch and Andy Petite, — were among those players who were using performance-enhancing drugs.

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