Feds Quizzed Vick On Steroids

JANUARY 6--A Drug Enforcement Administration informant told agents that Michael Vick once spoke about steroids and human growth hormone with a dealer, telling the man that he "liked his product," The Smoking Gun has learned.

When questioned about the informant's claim, the football star told federal investigators that the conversation never happened and stated that he "never used steroids or any type of human growth hormones," according to an investigative memo released in response to a TSG Freedom of Information Act request.

The document, a copy of which you'll find here, recounts an October 2007 interview with Vick that was attended by federal prosecutors, FBI agents, and Department of Agriculture investigators (the Vick debriefing was one of several conducted after the athlete pleaded guilty to federal dog fighting charges). Along with being questioned about killing dogs and whether other NFL players were involved in dog fighting, Vick was questioned about information provided by the DEA source.

A federal prosecutor asked Vick about a December 2006 Atlanta Falcons team party during which the alleged conversation about steroids occurred. "Vick was reportedly overheard telling" the dealer (whose name was redacted from the memo) that he "liked his product," according to the Memorandum of Interview prepared by a case agent with the Department of Agriculture's Office of Inspector General.

Other memos released as part of the TSG FOIA request recount interviews with confidential witnesses who helped agents build a federal case against the athlete. One source recalled selling Vick three pit bulls and "1/2 ounce of marijuana (weed)." A second witness told of seeing Vick and two cronies "shooting dogs and killing them with a shovel," and "breaking a dog's back and neck by slamming the dog to the ground until it was dead." The witness, whose name was redacted from the May 2007 interview report, added that Vick and his pals appeared to get an "adenaline high" from killing the animals. (5 pages)