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Final Whitewater report: We suspect a lot but really can't prove anything
Capital Hill Blue ^
| March 21, 2002
Posted on 03/21/2002 1:41:31 PM PST by Stand Watch Listen
The prosecutor's final report on Whitewater concluded the Clintons' Arkansas land venture benefited from criminal activity and that the president and first lady gave factually inaccurate testimony, but that there was not enough evidence to prove the former first family engaged in wrongdoing.
The Clintons' lawyer called the five-volume report, the product of a $70 million, six-year investigation, "the most expensive exoneration in history."
Independent Counsel Robert Ray's report, released Wednesday, said that "some of the statements given by both the President and the First Lady during official investigations were factually inaccurate," but added that there was not enough evidence to prove either of the Clintons lied.
There was evidence that Bill Clinton should have suspected financial improprieties at his Whitewater business partner's financial institution, the report said.
It also said investigators had gathered testimony from a confidential White House witness and two others that called into question Hillary Rodham Clinton's sworn denial she had nothing to do with the disappearance and mysterious 1996 discovery of billing records from her law firm.
The witnesses said they saw Mrs. Clinton "carrying records which had the appearance of the billing records in July 1995," long after the records had been subpoenaed. The records weren't turned over to prosecutors until January 1996.
A jury "could conclude that Mrs. Clinton had the billing records in the White House in August 1995 or thereafter," the report said. "But the evidence was insufficient to obtain and sustain a conviction beyond a reasonable doubt."
Those billing records ultimately revealed Mrs. Clinton had done legal work for Whitewater partner James McDougal that was later used by McDougal to conceal illegal acts on a real estate project, the report said. Mrs. Clinton is now a U.S. senator from New York.
Ray's report also chastised the former president for his repeated attacks on the Whitewater investigation, which Clinton dismissed over the years as politically motivated and unfair.
"By calling a duly authorized law enforcement investigation `bogus,' the president impugns and undermines not just this office but also courts, judges and juries who together have validated this investigation and the prosecutions brought," Ray wrote.
The report is the final product of a six-year inquiry that — along with its offshoots — cast a cloud over the Clinton presidency, had three different prosecutors, prompted a presidential impeachment and created bitter divisions between Republicans and Democrats.
While the Clintons were never prosecuted, the investigation ensnared several of their friends and political supporters. Whitewater business partners James and Susan McDougal, close friend Webster Hubbell and former Arkansas Gov. Jim Guy Tucker were among 14 people convicted of crimes.
Ray finished the report last fall and stepped down recently to run for the U.S. Senate in New Jersey as a Republican. The three-judge panel that supervised his investigation released the report Wednesday after giving time to the parties affected by it to review the document.
Kendall, the Clintons' lawyer, called the investigation "unprecedented in its length, expense and intensity.
"But it ends as it began, with no evidence of any wrongdoing by the Clintons," Kendall said.
The report said the Clintons' partner, James McDougal, "engaged in numerous financial transactions" involving his failing Madison Guaranty savings and loan and other corporate entities to benefit the Whitewater venture in Arkansas that he had created with Clinton, then governor of Arkansas, and Mrs. Clinton, then a lawyer. In one instance, McDougal made a $25,000 downpayment from the proceeds of a fraudulent loan on property that was in Whitewater's name.
"Insufficient evidence exists to establish beyond a reasonable doubt that either Governor or Mrs. Clinton knowingly participated in the criminal financial transactions used by McDougal to benefit Whitewater," the report said.
It related an incident in which the Arkansas banking commissioner told Clinton in 1983 that there were problems at McDougal's financial institution. Clinton told the commissioner to do whatever was necessary and not to worry about politics, the report said.
Part of the investigation focused on a fraudulent $300,000 federally backed loan that a Little Rock judge claimed he was pressured by Clinton to make to the McDougals. Clinton denied knowing anything about the loan and denied pressuring the judge.
"Insufficient evidence also exists to prove beyond a reasonable doubt that Governor Clinton knew of or approved" the loan, Ray's report said.
"There is some evidence that Governor Clinton knew or should have known that Jim McDougal was not conducting Madison Guaranty's affairs as required by banking rules," it said.
The investigation found evidence Mrs. Clinton did legal work for McDougal's S&L on a real estate venture known as Castle Grande, a venture that prosecutors concluded was fraudulent.
Prosecutors investigated whether there was an attempt by Mrs. Clinton to obstruct the Whitewater investigation by hiding her billing records until they turned up inside a third-floor room in the White House residence. Mrs. Clinton denied under oath knowing how the records disappeared or ended up in the White House.
"The evidence gathered could not exclude the possibility that Mrs. Clinton put the billing records in Room 319A," the report said.
TOPICS: Business/Economy; Crime/Corruption; Editorial; Government; News/Current Events
KEYWORDS: billingrecords; clintonscandals; jamesmcdougal; jimguytucker; madisonguaranty; robertray; room319a; vincefoster; websterhubbell; whitewater
Another related article from the same source:
However you view Whitewater, it's finally over
DAVID WIESSLER
With the independent prosecutor's filing of the final report on Whitewater, the long national scandal is over.
Or to haters of Bill Clinton, the long national cover-up or miscarriage of justice is over. Or to Clinton supporters, the long national witchhunt. Or to late night television comedians, the long national joke.
Well before Sept. 11 drastically rearranged what people considered important in their lives and their elected officials, Whitewater had begun receding into the misty history of scandals decades old, like Teapot Dome in the 1920s.
Monica Lewinsky became the new name for scandal. Impeachment came and went and so did Clinton. George W. Bush moved into the White House and after Sept. 11 the country went on a war footing.
The independent prosecutor long ago said there would be no charges against the former president or his wife, Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton (news - web sites). The filing of the final report on Wednesday was just a formality required by law.
But once upon a time, Whitewater was the rage.
Lawmakers bellowed. Committees met. Lawyers argued. Juries deliberated. Headlines screamed. Comedians joked.
Some people went to jail.
And Vince Foster, White House counsel and close friend to the Clintons, committed suicide.
Whitewater began with the Clintons taking out a loan in 1978 to invest in property along the White River in the Arkansas Ozark Mountains that they and friends hoped to develop into a recreation area.
But by the time Clinton was running for president 14 years later, investigators and reporters were looking into reports of fraud, misuse of federally backed loans and other infractions, many of them obscure and complicated.
Clinton's opponents claimed the Whitewater affair was just the tip of the iceberg in a scandal-ridden administration run by a power couple who lacked moral compass or public responsibility.
Republicans in Congress called for committee hearings and saw all sorts of other abuses -- firing of innocent employees in the White House travel office, misuse of secret FBI (news - web sites) personnel files, insider help for Mrs. Clinton on commodity futures trading, and missing files and evidence among other outrages.
Supporters of the Clintons saw a witchhunt over a failed real estate deal conducted by political partisans who were mad at Clinton for beating President George Bush in 1992 and did not like a first lady who projected a strong image of herself instead of playing a subservient role.
Like reading the names at the bottom of the credits following a three-hour movie, those involved drift through the memory with vague recognition.
James and Susan McDougal. David Hale. Jim Guy Tucker. Webster Hubbell. Castle Grande. Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan. All were major names once. Now, it's hard to remember why.
One major result from the Whitewater scandal came from the appointment of an independent counsel to investigate the scandal and try to remove it from the political realm.
The person chosen was Ken Starr, who would eventually take his investigation into new areas, including tape recordings of Lewinsky talking about her affair with the president of the United States.
When another scandal called Watergate drove Richard Nixon from the presidency nearly three decades ago, his successor, Gerald Ford, felt it necessary to go on television to tell the country the long national nightmare was over.
The final Whitewater report merely said: "The independent counsel conducted a thorough and comprehensive investigation, which has now concluded. Matters involving Madison Guaranty/Whitewater are closed."
To: Stand Watch Listen
Not to worry
Slick will get his
Maybe he already has. . . .
maybe being married to the witch. . .
. . . . . and that two sacker ugly daughter. . . . . .
2
posted on
03/21/2002 2:02:34 PM PST
by
DeaconRed
To: Voter#537
You're generous. His skank daughter is a four sacker.
3
posted on
03/21/2002 3:15:46 PM PST
by
IncPen
To: Stand Watch Listen;all;clintonscandals
Here are the top 13 of 1300 links:
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Get the Top 10 websites for "Whitewater "
| 3. |
Another Whitewater Death |
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Topic: White Water Another Whitewater Death WorldnetDaily March 31, 1998 Un-signed Johnny Franklin Lawhorn Jr., 29, the transmission shop owner who discovered Whitewater documents and a cashier's chec
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Whitewater: Case Closed [Free Republic] |
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Ray closes book on Whitewater [Free Republic] |
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4
posted on
03/21/2002 3:42:15 PM PST
by
backhoe
To: backhoe
5
posted on
03/21/2002 8:55:20 PM PST
by
Cvengr
To: Cvengr
Thanks- I copied and will use that link!
6
posted on
03/22/2002 12:47:17 AM PST
by
backhoe
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