Posted on 12/27/2002 4:33:04 PM PST by prognostigaator
Clinton's Still Haunted By FBI Files Scandal
Federal District Judge Royce C. Lamberth, a Reagan appointee who often has ruled against the Clinton administration, may be nearing two decisions of profound importance for the president's legacy and for the first lady's future.
At issue is the most mysterious of the Clinton scandals: discovery at the White House of more than 900 secret FBI personnel files, including dossiers of prominent Republicans. For more than six months, Lamberth has had on his desk requests for sworn testimony by two people--a former White House aide's ex-wife who claims Hillary Rodham Clinton was associated with the files affair, and Mrs. Clinton herself. Lawyers familiar with Lamberth's court believe his decision is imminent.
The judge has more to consider than one woman's unsubstantiated allegations. Conservative Larry Klayman's Judicial Watch has collected at least 14 pieces of evidence in his class-action suit in behalf of people claiming exposure of their confidential files violated their privacy. His evidence certainly does not prove Mrs. Clinton's complicity, but suggests this was more than the FBI blunder described by the White House.
How could a sole controversial judicial activist uncover such material when special prosecutor Kenneth Starr in late 1998 gave President Clinton a clean bill of health on the files scandal? Sources close to Starr's investigation say the burdens of simultaneous prosecutions in Washington and Little Rock forced him to pick and choose. Uninhibited by such demands, Klayman has ploughed ahead, collecting affidavits on a matter that even Republicans have abandoned, but Democrats consider the most dangerous of all Clinton improprieties.
The most recent Judicial Watch affidavit was taken Jan. 7 from Deborah Perroy, a former National Security Council aide. In 1993, one evening after working hours, she said, "I came upon" her superior, NSC administrative director Robert Manzanares, and his assistant, Marcia Dimel, "looking through top-secret personnel background files" in the NSC's CIA liaison office--an off-limits area for them.
Asserting that Manzanares and Dimel were removing background files from a safe and "keeping some sort of list," Perroy said the files included FBI information on "virtually every top political and NSC aide to Presidents Reagan and Bush." She added that her colleagues "clearly reacted as if they did not expect me and had been caught doing something improper."
Although she left the White House in 1993, Perroy did not "come forward until now," she said, "for fear of retaliation by the Clinton White House." She added she was encouraged to speak out when she learned of an affidavit from another former White House staffer, Sheryl L. Hall.
Hall, a computer specialist who resigned last September, said her duties included helping Clinton administration lawyers reply to plaintiffs in the file scandal. Michelle Peterson of the White House counsel's office, Hall said, last spring "told me in her office that `our strategy' for the Filegate lawsuit was to `stall' because `we had just a couple of years to go.' " White House spokesmen had no comment on either Perroy's or Hall's deposition.
Lamberth now is considering the request for sworn testimony by the first lady and Leslie Gail Kennedy, who in 1994 was married to former White House Associate Counsel William Kennedy. Last June 11, Mrs. Kennedy told a Judicial Watch interviewer that she in 1994 observed her husband "on several occasions" transferring FBI files into his laptop computer. She expressed the opinion that Mrs. Clinton, her ex-husband's former law partner in Little Rock, was using the files against enemies of health reform.
To consider whether the first lady should be put under oath, Lamberth might ponder the Dec. 14, 1998, deposition by the ubiquitous Linda Tripp. She testified that on two occasions she heard Kennedy talking about transferring FBI files into the White House database and that senior White House staffer Marsha Scott told him "Mrs. Clinton wanted this done." Is this enough to suggest that Ken Starr overlooked the worst Clinton scandal?
Robert Novak appears on the CNN programs "Capital Gang" at 6 p.m. Saturday and "Evans, Novak, Hunt and Shields" at 4:30 p.m. Saturday and 10 a.m. Sunday.
White House went after aide's FBI file
FBI Files List (a comparison)
FBI Files List
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Making Starr Squirm
KENNEDY ADMITS HE KEPT FBI FILES!
White House Files On Enemies Given To Porn King Larry Flynt
Despite denials, Clinton is planning a full campaign of retribution using FBI and IRS files
CIA SEIZES FILES OF CLINTON FUNDRAISER
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Who Had The Files and Why?
Cox to Take Lead Role in FBI Files Investigation
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HOLY MOLY!!! CLINTON MET WITH CRAIG LIVINGSTONE THE DAY AFTER THE INFAMOUS 'WHITE HOUSE FBI FILES' WERE FIRST REQUESTED!!!
THE MEETING
Silicon Valley Logic April 28, 1998
According to Secret Service logs, Bill Clinton had a rare meeting with Craig Livingstone, ex-White House security man and the keeper of the infamous "FBI files," on December 7, 1993.
Incredibly, that meeting took place the very day after FBI logs show that Livingstone and his men first began to request the "unjustifiably obtained" FBI files!
FBI logs show that starting on December 6, 1993, "a series of 481 requests which bear the characteristics of a single alphabetical series" were sent from Livingstone's office in the White House, all with the notation "ACCESS," indicating that they were to be used to facilitate security clearances. This series of files is the same that was later found by the FBI to have been "improperly sought," and which contained confidential and personal information on many enemies of the Clinton administration.
White House entry logs show that Livingstone entered the residence the very next day, on Dec. 7, 1993, at 7:23 p.m. to meet with POTUS - the president. The meeting on December 7th was one of only two face-to-face meetings on the record between Bill Clinton and Livingstone, who was later fired for his role in the FBI files controversy.
Complete details on the illegitimately-obtained FBI files can be found at this location on the FBI's web site.
In a statement made on June 14, 1996, the FBI said, "We now know that many of these 481 requests, while facially valid, were without justification and served no official purpose. In recognition of this fact, the White House Counsel's Office has voluntarily surrendered to the FBI more than 400 folders containing FBI records since June 6, 1996."
The FBI began its inquiry into the inappropriately-obtained files on June 5, 1996, at the instruction of FBI Director Louis J. Freeh, after he learned that the White House had, in December 1993, sought background information relating to Billy Ray Dale, several months after he had been fired from the White House travel office. Dale's file was one of those requested in the series that began on December 6, 1993, and ranged alphabetically from "A" to "G."
The White House was aware long before June, 1996 that its FBI file gathering operation was improper, quotes the FBI: "An employee of OPS had determined, over time, that these materials had been inappropriately gathered." But instead of admitting its mistake immediately, the White House archived these files for future use, and did not return them to the FBI until June 6, 1996, the day after Louis Freeh began his investigation into the matter.
President and Mrs. Clinton claimed not to have participated in the hiring of Livingstone, which is in direct conflict with statements from their own senior staff to FBI agents, who said Livingstone was brought on board at the While House with the first couple's consent.. Craig Livingstone's attorney recently boasted that his client was clear of potential prosecution, but it is likely that this latest revelation will make the future testimony of Mr. Livingstone of great interest to those investigating the FBI files matter.
Ironically, the Clinton administration originally laid the blame for the FBI files mess on the Secret Service, which is currently standing in defense of Bill Clinton against Kenneth Starr. Please email your comments, or any additional information relevant to this exclusive story, to the editors of Silicon Valley Logic.
HIRING OF CRAIG LIVINGSTONE FAILS TO PASS 'SMELL TEST'
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