McNamee was a personal trainer for several players, notably Roger Clemens, Andy Pettitte and Chuck Knoblauch. Clemens apparently was a close personal friend of McNamee. (He was also a team trainer for the Yankees and Blue Jays.)
McNamee told baseball special investigator George Mitchell and his commission that he provided performance-enhancing drugs to Clemens, Pettitte and Knoblauch. McNamee said he began injecting Clemens from 1998 through 2001.
McNamee received a doctorate from a diploma-mill university – he referred to himself as a doctor in business ventures - and is also a former policeman.
Clemens says McNamee injected him with vitamin B-12 and lidocaine, not steroids and HGH. McNamee says he never administered B-12.
Clemens filed a defamation suit against McNamee in civil court. McNamee has hinted at a countersuit.
After McNamee's allegations became public, Clemens and McNamee had a phone conversation, which Clemens taped. In the conversation, Clemens said all he wanted was the truth, and McNamee never agreed or disagreed. “It is what it is, and it's not good. And I want it to go away. And I'm with you. I'm in your corner. I don't want this to happen. But I'd also like not to go to jail, too,” McNamee said.
After Clemens released the tape of the conversation to the media, McNamee said he decided to release the one bit of physical evidence he had, which were used syringes and gauze that he said would prove his allegations. However, it's unlikely that any of this evidence would be admissible in any court because of issues related to “chain of custody” and whether the syringes and gauze were stored adequately (refrigerated, air-tight, etc.).
In the Mitchell Report, McNamee said Clemens was in attendance at a party hosted by noted steroid user Jose Canseco in 1998, and that he observed Clemens, Canseco and a third party in a meeting. Clemens said he was golfing and did not attend the party. Canseco, a teammate on three different teams, said Clemens wasn't at the party.
Canseco said in the Mitchell Report that he had numerous discussions with Clemens about steroids, but never said that he knew Clemens used steroids. Canseco told federal investigators that Clemens did not "use, possess or ask for steroids or human growth hormone."
A nanny of Clemens said that Clemens and his wife, Debbie, were at the Canseco party at some point, and that Clemens' children and nanny had even spent the night at Canseco's home. In the congressional hearing, it was insinuated by chairman Henry Waxman (D-Calif.) that Clemens' lawyers might have tampered with a witness by contacting the former nanny before congressional investigators could.
McNamee told congressional lawyers during his deposition that he injected Debbie Clemens, Roger Clemens' wife,with HGH. Debbie Clemens' wife is a fitness instructor and once posed with Roger Clemens in a husband-wife pictorial for Sports Illustrated's swimsuit issue.
Roger Clemens acknowledged having 'very heated' discussions with McNamee regarding HGH usage by Debbie after she started having circulation problems following the injection.
Pettitte and Knoblauch have acknowledged that they did use HGH, validating some of McNamee's claims. Pettitte told the committee that Clemens told him that he had taken HGH in 1999 or 2000. Clemens believes Pettitte misheard him, and that he was talking about Debbie Clemens' use of HGH. However, all parties agreed that Debbie Clemens took HGH in 2003, several years later. Clemens told a congressional committee that Pettitte was “misremembering” that conversation.
