SALT LAKE CITY -- Jury selection started Tuesday in the Olympic bribery trial, which will determine whether two Salt Lake City bid leaders broke the law to bring the 2002 Winter Games to Utah.

The jury will be selected from about 80 prospects who filed into the federal courtroom past tight security. U.S. District Judge David Sam expected a jury to be impaneled as early as Tuesday afternoon.

The trial could last as long as six weeks. Tom Welch, 59, the bid leader, and Dave Johnson, 44, his deputy, are accused of doling out $1 million in cash, gifts and favors to win the Winter Games for Salt Lake City. The defense argues that the extravagant gifts to Olympic officials were merely business as usual.

Utah Gov. Mike Leavitt, who is President Bush's nominee to lead the Environmental Protection Agency, is among those scheduled to testify.

The scandal was the worst in Olympic history, and it resulted in the expulsion or resignation of 10 IOC members.

Welch and Johnson have maintained their innocence and insist Utah's political and business elite knew what they were doing.

``It was open and notorious that people in the IOC were treated like royalty,'' said Max Wheeler, Johnson's lawyer.

The defendants were indicted in 2000 on 15 felony charges, including bribery racketeering, conspiracy and fraud.

They have twice rejected the government's offer of a plea deal on a single count of tax fraud.

``I'm not looking for a deal and I don't expect one. Nor do I want one,'' said Welch, a business consultant.

Welch and Johnson could face up to 75 years in prison if convicted of all charges, though any actual sentence most likely would be far shorter.

In 2001, Sam threw out the case, sparing Salt Lake City the embarrassment of a courtroom spectacle leading up to the 2002 Games.

Then in April of this year, the 10th U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals in Denver reversed Sam's order and said the bid leaders must stand trial.

Welch and Johnson received financial settlements from the Salt Lake Organizing Committee after their firings. The committee's insurer is paying millions of dollars for their legal fees.