She did everything but wag her finger at a television camera, the way Rafael Palmeiro would do a year later in front of Congress, the way cheesy politicians do when denying one indiscretion or another.

"I can tell you this," Jones said at a pre-Olympic publicity appearance in New York. "That if I make the Olympic team, which I plan to do in Sacramento, and I am held from the Olympic Games because of something that somebody thought, you can pretty much expect that there will be lawsuits."

Guilty, I thought, right then and there. She is trying to impress us with a show of anger. Of course, it is easy to think athletes are guilty of juicing themselves, since the evidence is that many of them are.

This was before Tyler Hamilton and Floyd Landis tested positive, before that pathetic appearance by Mark McGwire and Palmeiro in front of Congress, but I was already pretty immune to athletes who bluster.

Sorry, but I do not feel any more sorry for Jones, who has two children and another husband, than I do for Landis, who recently became the first winner of the Tour de France to be busted for testing positive.

Landis is turning doughy out in California, on a training regimen of ice cream and beer, after testing positive for artificial testosterone. Jones should give back her five Olympic medals from 2000 after pleading guilty to perjury on Friday and will most likely be going away for a few months.

This may seem vindictive on my part, but when do we start getting angry about athletes who scam for dollars? They are scamming their colleagues, and they are scamming you and me.

The best thing Jones can do now is tell the truth about her former coach Trevor Graham, whose trial comes later this year. She may add a few details to what is known about the infamous Bay Area Laboratory Co-Operative in California, which in turn may bring about a perjury indictment for Barry Bonds, Balco's most famous customer.

The federal prosecutors in the Bay Area seem willing to indict for perjury. Perhaps Jones' testimony will give them enough to go after Bonds, who denied, under oath, knowing what Balco was supplying him.

If prosecutors can make a case against Bonds, why shouldn't he go to jail the way Jones is going to? He is the home run king of baseball, although currently without a team since the Giants reaped the benefit of his record-breaking chase, then cut him loose.

Jones was track and field's version of Bonds, the only woman to win five Olympic medals, three of them gold, in one Summer Games, in 2000 in Sydney. Her feat was even greater considering she was running with the considerable bulk of her husband at the time — the shot-putter C J Hunter, who was barred from the Games after testing positive for steroids — symbolically draped around her shoulders. Back then, some of us felt sorry for Jones as the embodiment of an admirable woman who chose bad company.

By 2004, that was a tired act. During that media summit in New York, Jones was the star attraction because of the drug rumours and her fame. Her companion at the time, Tim Montgomery, did not arrive with her, even though he was also a star runner.  Montgomery was said to have a stomach affliction that morning. Given the legal problems he was facing, it was understandable why he might have felt q ueasy about flying to New York. He has since pleaded guilty to bank fraud and embezzlement and faces a jail term this year.

Of course, there is some question whether Montgomery and Jones knew they had done anything wrong. More likely, they felt empowered to take and say whatever they wanted, the way the famous and the powerful do, particularly in sports. "I'm not just going to sit down and let someone or a group of people or an organisation take away my livelihood because of a hunch, because of a thought, because of somebody who is trying to show their power," Jones said that day.

As it happened, Jones did not win a medal in the 2004 Summer Games in Athens, where she seemed to be a shell of herself. Nothing like a more level playing field. For example, Guillermo Mota had a good two months pitching for the Mets at the end of 2006, but at the start of this season was suspended for 50 games under the tough penalties Congress virtually forced on baseball and the players union.

When Mota came back, his earned run average soared to 5.76, and he was one of the leading symptoms of a late-season collapse. Presumably clean, he was never the same. Tighter testing and better lab work are marvellous things. So is prosecution for perjury.


HIGHS AND LOWS
*Born: October 10, 1975, Los Angeles.

*Jones won gold medals in the 100 metres, 200 metres and 4x400-metre relay and bronze medals in long jump and 4x100-metre relay in Sydney Olympics, which made her the first woman to win five medals in a single Olympics.


*Jones has long been tied to BALCO, the California nutritional supplement company at the centre of a steroid scandal. 

*Jones had never failed a drug test until 2006 when traces of the banned substance EPO were found. She was cleared when a backup test proved negative.

*Jones' first husband, shotputter C J Hunter, was suspended from competition after testing positive for steroids four times in 2000.

*Tim Montgomery, Jones' ex-boyfriend and father of her son, once had the world's fastest time in the 100 metres but was stripped of the 2002 record after he admitted using steroids and human growth hormone from BALCO.

*Jones currently is married to another former sprinter, Obadele Thompson and lives in Austin, Texas.

*In her prime, Jones earned millions of dollars through product endorsements and up to $80,000 per race.


New York Times News Service