-Caveat Lector- >From Undernews 2/26/01 http://prorev.com BILLY, ROGER, THE MOB, AND THE FEDS THE PARDON SCANDAL has brought to some media and political circles the first glimmer of comprehension of the deep and corrosive connections between WJ Clinton and the criminal underworld. These connections have been apparent from the start to those who bothered to look behind the patina of the Clinton myth. Clinton was raised by mob-connected relatives and backed in his campaigns by members of the Dixie Mafia - including major drug traffickers. He used their cocaine, appointed them, covered for them, looked the other way for them, partied with them, cut deals with them, and now has pardoned some of them. The Marc Rich pardon opens one window on this little covered, sordid side of the Clinton saga, as does the commutation of Carlos Vignali's sentence. Vignali was sent to jail in 1994 for conspiring to sell 800 pounds of cocaine. He has said that the word was out in prisons that the White House was open for pardon business. Now the word is out elsewhere that the war on drugs means little if you have a line to the White House. But the pardon that perhaps offers the best insight into the real Bill Clinton is that of his half-brother Roger. Roger is being falsely presented as a small time user who got caught. In fact, when his case was coming to trial, the US attorney, Asa Hutchinson, described him as one of the "tentacles of the drug distribution system" in Arkansas. Roger early developed a four-gram, 16 times a day cocaine habit, getting his stuff from New York and Medellin suppliers, based (as one middleman would later testify) on "who his brother was." According to federal drug probe testimony, Sharlene Wilson, one of his dealers, began selling cocaine to Roger as early as 1979. A therapist would testify later that Roger had been getting close to a "lethal dose." Meanwhile the Clinton boys' mother was hanging out at the race track with mobsters and other local figures, including Dan Lasater who bred race horses in Kentucky and Florida and had a box at the track next to hers. Mrs. Clinton introduced Lasater to Roger Clinton. Lasater gave Roger work and later loaned him $8,000 to help pay off a $20,000 drug debt. Lasater was a colorful character who made his early money with his Ponderosa steak house operation. His later sources of income would become far less clear, but he had plenty of money to throw around. According to FBI reports cited by Ambrose Evans-Pritchard, he lost a Lear jet in Colombia in 1977 after authorities there seized it on suspicion of narcotics trafficking. Among the passengers on the jet was Jamiel "Jimmy" Chagra, a major American mob boss. Evans-Pritchard reports that the DEA opened a file on Lasater in 1983. Lasater was tipped off at once by one of his friendly sources in law enforcement. On another occasion he bailed out the governor of Kentucky, John Y. Brown, delivering $300,000 in cash in a paper bag to Brown at the Lexington airport. He also offered New Mexico governor Tony Anaya a job at the end of his term. The governor declined, but built - with taxpayer's funds - a 8,900 foot runway at Lasater's Angel Fire Ski Resort. Later, a US Customs investigative report would note that the resort was being used for drug operations and money laundering. The state attorney general investigated Lasaster for suspected "narcotics trafficking via aircraft with possible organized crime ties." Lasater also bought a ranch in Belize that was reportedly used for drug trafficking. One drug pilot described to Evans-Pritchard the trip from Belize to Arkansas, including having once been met by his pickup - an Arkansas trooper in a marked car. Said the pilot, "Arkansas was a very good place to load and unload." Sharlene Wilson partied with both the Clinton boys. She told the London Telegraph's Ambrose Evans-Pritchard in 1995 that she sold two grams of cocaine to Bill Clinton at the Little Rock nightclub Le Bistro: "I watched Bill Clinton lean up against a brick wall. He was so messed up that night, he slid down the wall into a garbage can and just sat there like a complete idiot." Wilson also described gatherings at Little Rock's Coachman's Inn between 1979 and 1981, where she saw Clinton using cocaine "quite avidly" with friends. State drug prosecutor Jean Duffey said that she had no doubt that Wilson was telling the truth. The stories were confirmed by others. Two Arkansas state troopers swore under oath that they had seen Clinton "under the influence" of drugs when he was governor. Historian Roger Morris, in his book "Partners in Power," quoted several law enforcement officials who claimed to have seen and knew of Clinton's drug use. One-time apartment manager Jane Parks said that in 1984 she would listen through the wall as Bill and Roger Clinton, in a room adjoining hers, discussed the quality of the drugs they were taking as they partied with numerous women noisily enough that neighbors complained. The same year, Hot Springs police recorded Roger Clinton during a cocaine transaction in which he is heard saying, "Got to get some for my brother. He's got a nose like a vacuum cleaner." According to some witnesses, Lasater had a back door pass to the governor's mansion, and one state trooper reported taking Clinton to Lasater's office regularly and waiting forty-five minutes or an hour for him to come out. Although similar stories about Washington mayor Marion Barry were widely circulated, the Clinton cocaine connection was kept under wraps by the Washington press. In 1984, a Clinton bodyguard, state trooper L.D. Brown, applied for a CIA opening. Clinton gave him help on his application essay including making it more Reaganesque on the topic of Nicaragua. According to Brown, he met a CIA recruiter in Dallas whom he later identified as former member of Vice President Bush's staff. On the recruiter's instruction, he also met with notorious drug dealer Barry Seal in a Little Rock restaurant, later joining Seal in flight to Honduras with a purported shipment of M16s and a return load of duffel bags. Brown got $2,500 in small bills for the flight. Concerned about the mission, Brown consulted with Clinton who said, "Oh, you can handle it, don't sweat it." On second flight, Brown found cocaine in a duffel bag and again he sought Clinton's counsel. Clinton allegedly said to the politically conservative Brown, "Your buddy Bush knows about it" and of the cocaine, "that's Lasater's deal." According to Morris, the then 27-year-old Roger Clinton's name began to appear in federal and local narcotics files in early 1984. He already had a string of other offenses, including speeding and drunk driving, none of which prevented his brother from appointing him to the state crime commission's juvenile advisory board. He was soon removed for nonattendance. Roger Clinton's actions were caught both on videotape and by wired informers, one of whom recorded him negotiating a $10,000 coke deal. A video caught him discussing payoffs to arrange state approval of sewer lines in a development. Roger said, "I need $10,000 for my brother to take care of EPA regs and other environmental oversight problems." And between 1983 and 1985, state troopers at the governor's mansion logged Roger in at least 36 times with "females," "girl," or "a friend." But the big time drug operative began running into big time trouble. Someone slashed his convertible's roof and stole $8,000 worth of cocaine. His New York and Medillin dealers were on his case and, according to his own and Lasater's later statements to police and FBI, they even threatened his mother and Bill. It was the last thing Bill needed and he got Lasater to provide a haven for Roger at his 1000-acre horse ranch in Ocala FL, where the drug parties and lifestyle continued with more safety. Roger Morris quotes a senior employee at the ranch as saying, "I was told we were stashing him for some politician Mr. Lasater was working." In 1985, Clinton established the Arkansas Development Finance Authority that would become, in the words of one well-connected Arkansan "his own political piggy bank." Though millions of dollars were funneled to Clinton allies, records of repayments would be hazy or non-existent. Dan Lasater was a major underwriter and got a $30 million bond deal for state police radios even as Roger Clinton was making a bargain with the US attorney to testify against Lasater in a drug case. Later, an investigator found evidence of an electronic transfer of $50 million from the Arkansas Development Financial Authority to a bank in the Cayman Islands. Grand Cayman had a population of 18,000, 570 commercial banks, one bank regulator and a bank secrecy law. It has been a favorite destination spot for laundered drug money. Meanwhile, there was a struggle between those trying to quash the growing case against Roger Clinton and Dan Lasater and those trying to make sure it went ahead. In the end, the case was pursued but simultaneously it was ensured that the investigation would go no further. In 1986 Lasater pled guilty to cocaine distribution charges after the younger Clinton copped a plea and agreed to testify against Lasater and Roger's friend, Sam Anderson Jr. One law enforcement official described the investigation into Lasater's operations as "either a high dive or extremely unprofessional. Take your pick." It seems clear to some that the US prosecutor on the case, George Proctor, found it best not to dig too deep. While Lasater was in prison, his affairs were run by Patsy Thomasson, who later would become a White House aide, responsible, among other things, for drug testing. George Proctor would become a high Justice Department official, heading an office that handled, among other things, narcotics and the BCCI case. Historian Morris writes, "Law enforcement officials were dismayed and angry at the stunted probe of Lasater. Whatever the limits or extent of Lasater's cocaine trafficking or the nature of his other dealings, most believe that beyond him the larger corruption in Little Rock and elsewhere pointed unmistakably to organized crime, not to mention the vast crimes of Mena - none of which would be pursued." In 1989 Terry Reed filed a civil action against Buddy Young, chief of the Clinton security detail and later a top FEMA official. Reed asrgued that he had been framed after trying to pull away from his involvement in the Iran-Contra machinations. His suit threatened to expose not only Clinton misdeeds but details of the Contra guns-for-drugs scheme. Ambrose Evans-Pritchard reports in "The Secret Life of Bill Clinton" that one witness, trooper Patterson, had testified that there were "large quantities of drugs being flown into Mena airport, large quantities of money, large quantities of guns." One estimate was that ten million dollars were passing through Mena every week. Patterson said the matter was repeatedly discussed in front of Clinton by his bodyguards. Patterson said the governor had "very little comment to make; he was just listening to what was being said." Reed's case unraveled when the state judge ruled that no evidence regarding Mena, the CIA, Dan Lasater, the Arkansas Development Finance Agency, or the Clintons would be permitted. In 1990 Dan Lasater was pardoned by Governor Clinton after serving just six months in jail and four in a halfway house on minor charges. The pardon, which was of dubious value given that Lasater had been charged under federal law, was purportedly issued so that Lasater could get a hunting license. Lasater returned to his 7,400 acre ranch in Saline County. Four years later Gandy Baugh, an attorney who had represented Lasater, jumped to his death. Baugh's law partner committed suicide a month after Baugh. That same year, according to Greg Hitt of Dow Jones News Service, minutes of a high level Resolution Trust Corporation meeting included this note: "Dan Lasater may have been establishing depository accounts at Madison and other financial institutions and laundering drug money through them via brokered deposits and bond issues." In 1996, Lasater testified before Congress. In his trial and in testimony before the Senate Whitewater committee, Lasater admitted to being free with coke, including ashtrays full of it on his corporate jet. He also admitted to having given coke to employees and to minors. But he took umbrage at being called a drug dealer since he claimed he didn't charge for the stuff. The New York Times, among many other mainstream media, did not bother to cover the story despite Lasater's closeness to the Clintons. In fact, that year, Clinton scandals rated all of one hour and twelve minutes on major evening TV news programs. The other day, the three major networks spent 33 minutes in just one evening on Clinton scandals. That's a form of progress. Maybe some day they and the rest of the corporate media will take a few minutes and explain to us how and why it was that for nearly a decade they gave a preemptive pardon to a national politician as mobbed up as any this country has ever seen. <A HREF="http://www.ctrl.org/">www.ctrl.org</A> DECLARATION & DISCLAIMER ========== CTRL is a discussion & informational exchange list. Proselytizing propagandic screeds are unwelcomed. Substance—not soap-boxing—please! These are sordid matters and 'conspiracy theory'—with its many half-truths, mis- directions and outright frauds—is used politically by different groups with major and minor effects spread throughout the spectrum of time and thought. That being said, CTRLgives no endorsement to the validity of posts, and always suggests to readers; be wary of what you read. CTRL gives no credence to Holocaust denial and nazi's need not apply. Let us please be civil and as always, Caveat Lector. ======================================================================== Archives Available at: http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html <A HREF="http://peach.ease.lsoft.com/archives/ctrl.html">Archives of [EMAIL PROTECTED]</A> http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/ <A HREF="http:[EMAIL PROTECTED]/">ctrl</A> ======================================================================== To subscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SUBSCRIBE CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] To UNsubscribe to Conspiracy Theory Research List[CTRL] send email: SIGNOFF CTRL [to:] [EMAIL PROTECTED] Om
