Independent counsel says ‘insufficient evidence’ to prove Clintons involved in any wrongdoing
BREAKING NEWS ASSOCIATED PRESS - MSNBC
WASHINGTON, March 20 — Independent Counsel Robert Ray concludes in his final Whitewater report that the land venture benefited from criminal transactions but there was “insufficient evidence” to prove former President Clinton or his wife participated in wrongdoing.
THE FIVE-VOLUME report, released Wednesday, wrapped up a six-year investigation of the Clintons’ finances and detailed the business transactions they undertook with partners Jim and Susan McDougal. The McDougals were convicted of crimes and imprisoned in the Whitewater investigation in connection with a failed savings and loan they operated. The report said Jim McDougal wrongly used funds from the failing S&L to benefit the Whitewater venture in Arkansas that he had created with Bill Clinton, then governor of Arkansas, and Hillary Rodham Clinton, then a lawyer. “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.
FOCUS ON HILLARY CLINTON The report also focused extensively on Hillary Clinton’s legal work on an Arkansas land development called Castle Grande that was being operated by Jim McDougal and partly financed by his failed S&L. The former first lady is now a senator representing New York. Her legal work on the project wasn’t disclosed until 1996, when her law firm billing records, which had been subpoenaed earlier in the case, were found in the White House family residence. Advertisement
Prosecutors, who investigated whether there was an attempt to obstruct by hiding the records, said they could never determine how the records got inside the Clinton residence. “The evidence gathered could not exclude the possibility that Mrs. Clinton put the billing records in Room 319A,” the report said. It noted that she gave sworn testimony “denying placing them in Room 319A or knowing how they got there.” Much of the evidence about Hillary Clinton’s activity as a lawyer for McDougal could have been laid out in a trial of her law firm partner, former Associate Attorney General Webster Hubbell. Hubbell, however, avoided trial by pleading guilty to a felony. The inspector general’s office of the Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. concluded that Hillary Clinton helped draft a legal document on Castle Grande which was later used by the S&L to mislead federal bank examiners. A panel of three federal appeals court judges that appointed Ray released the report Friday, about a year and a half after the independent counsel announced his investigation had concluded. The $70 million investigation of the Clintons which started in 1994 engendered bitterness in Washington and across America as Democratic defenders clashed with Republican opponents over the merits of the Whitewater allegations. Whitewater came to light during the 1992 presidential campaign when The New York Times revealed that the Clintons had been business partners in a real estate deal with the McDougals, whose S&L’s collapse cost taxpayers more than $65 million. The Clintons said they lost money in the Whitewater venture.
CONVICTIONS AND PARDONS The news stories triggered an inquiry by federal S&L regulators, culminating in a criminal investigation of the Clintons and successful prosecutions of their business partners and then-Arkansas Gov. Jim Guy Tucker for fraud in connection with various loans. A succession of prosecutors looked into the Clintons’ role — first Robert Fiske, then Kenneth Starr and finally Ray. In an attempt to reduce his prison sentence, Jim McDougal cooperated with prosecutors. He died in prison, leaving investigators without their most important witness. McDougal’s ex-wife, Susan, refused to cooperate with prosecutors. Clinton pardoned her just before he left office in January 2001. Two other major figures in the probe didn’t get pardons, Tucker and Hubbell. Clinton pardoned three other people convicted in Whitewater-related cases: a former Whitewater real estate agent, a university professor who had gotten a federally backed loan and a former appraiser at the McDougals’ S&L.
EARLIER REPORT ON LEWINSKY In a separate report earlier this month, Ray contended he probably could have gotten a conviction against the former president in the scandal involving former White House intern Monica Lewinsky. On his last full day in office, Clinton avoided the possibility of criminal indictment by admitting that he “knowingly gave evasive and misleading answers” about his sexual relationship with Lewinsky. Clinton also surrendered his law license for five years. In earlier reports, Ray found: —The first lady gave “factually false” testimony regarding her role in White House travel office firings. Hillary Clinton’s lawyer called the conclusion highly unfair and misleading. —There was no credible evidence of criminal activity in the White House’s improper gathering of hundreds of FBI background files on Republican employees.
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