-Caveat Lector-
>From wsws.org
"The indictment included a chilling threat to democratic rights and free
speech."
WSWS : News & Analysis : North America : Clinton Impeachment
Julie Hiatt Steele to fight Starr's indictment
By Jerry White
21 January 1999
Julie Hiatt Steele told a federal judge Tuesday that she was "absolutely
not guilty" of the charges brought by Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr of
obstruction of justice and making false statements. Following her not
quilty plea Steele told reporters outside the Alexandria, Virginia
courthouse that she would fight the Independent Counsel's indictment with
"every last breath in my body."
On January 7 Starr's grand jury charged Steele with three counts of
obstruction of justice and one count of making false statements, charges
which carry a maximum sentence of 35 years in prison. Steele was targeted
by Starr after she submitted an affidavit in the Paula Jones sexual
harassment suit, and subsequently gave testimony before Starr's grand
juries in Washington and Virginia, that undermined charges against Clinton
made by her one-time friend, Kathleen Willey.
Willey, a former White House volunteer, told Newsweek magazine in August
1997 that President Clinton had made an unwanted sexual advance towards her
in 1993. Steele initially told Newsweek reporter Michael Isikoff that
Willey told her of the incident shortly after it happened. Steele quickly
recanted her story, telling Isikoff that she had been asked by Willey to
lie. Steele's recanting undermined the Independent Counsel's plans to
include Willey's charges as part of his impeachment report to the House of
Representatives.
Steele's attorney, Nancy Luque, said she would seek the dismissal of the
case because it was incorrectly filed in Virginia. She said Starr wanted to
avoid dealing with the federal courts in the District of Columbia where he
suffered a setback when his case against Webster Hubbell, a longtime friend
of the Clintons, was thrown out by a federal judge. Luque also charged
Starr with a conflict of interest stemming from his numerous contacts with
lawyers in the Paula Jones case before he was appointed to investigate the
Clintons.
Luque said Starr's office has spent more than a year and $1 million to
indict Steele. The legal harassment included dragging Steele's brother and
daughter, as well as a former lawyer and accountant, before the grand jury
and the subpoenaing of her tax records, bank records, credit reports and
telephone records. Starr's investigators even threatened to challenge the
legality of the adoption of her eight-year-old son.
The indictment included a chilling threat to democratic rights and free
speech. As one example of her "obstruction of justice" Starr cited Steele's
appearance on the "Larry King Live" television program, where she refuted
Willey's story.
Starr timed the indictment to send a clear message to potential witnesses
in the Senate impeachment trial. In effect he was warning Monica Lewinsky,
Vernon Jordan, Betty Currie and others that they too could be indicted and
face long jail sentences if they do not testify as the Independent Counsel
wants.
Following her court appearance Tuesday Steele told Larry King, "I think we
all need to think about our First Amendment rights, and I think we better
think about this being our country. These were rights that we thought we
had, and we want to keep."
The 52-year-old single mother told the interviewer that since "this
nightmare began" she has not worked and has been forced to incur large
credit card debts to pay bills and raise her son. However, she said
defiantly, "I will not go to jail. I will be vindicated. I will fight. I am
not guilty. I will not be taken from my child, nor he from me, nor the rest
of my family hurt in that way. That's not going to happen. Not in this
country."
US District Judge Claude Hilton has set Steele's trial date for March 30.
See Also:
Starr indicts recalcitrant witness Julie Hiatt Steele
[9 January 1999]
Attorney for Julie Hiatt Steele charges Starr with abuse of prosecutorial
power
[9 January 1999]
A letter from a Massachusetts attorney
Continue your coverage and protests of the Julie Hiatt Steele indictment
[12 January 1999]
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