"Ronald Helm" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Either pay them off with hush money, threaten them like McDougall, or have
them become very sick just before they are to testify, hmmmm. Ron
Hubbell Got $700,000 for Little or No Work, House Probe Shows
By Susan Schmidt
Washington Post Staff Writer
Friday, April 24, 1998; Page A06
Webster L. Hubbell received more than $700,000, most of it from friends of
President Clinton and Democratic Party supporters, at a time when he was
under pressure from independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr to provide
information about Clinton in the Whitewater investigation, congressional
investigators have determined.
That amount is at least $200,000 greater than what has previously been known
about Hubbell's income after he left his post as associate attorney general
amid accusations that he had defrauded his former clients and partners at
the Little Rock law firm where he worked with Hillary Rodham Clinton.
Hubbell served an 18-month federal sentence after pleading guilty in late
1994 to tax evasion and mail fraud.
In addition to turning up more payments to Hubbell, the House Government
Reform and Oversight Committee found new details about them, including
evidence that Hubbell received money for his daughter's college tuition from
the head of the Lippo Group, an Indonesian conglomerate, and offered to
secure a government appointment for another client even after his
conviction.
Even as the House panel has investigated him, Hubbell faces the possibility
that Starr will bring new tax and fraud charges against him relating to the
funds. Grand juries in Little Rock and Washington have for months heard
testimony from a steady parade of witnesses about his consulting fees,
including the question of whether the funds were intended to buy Hubbell's
silence with prosecutors investigating the Clintons.
Starr's office has been investigating the role of Clinton advisers in
helping Hubbell sign up clients. Among those who came to Hubbell's aid were
then-U.S. Trade Representative Mickey Kantor, who is now a key member of
Clinton's legal defense team in the Monica S. Lewinsky matter, and Vernon E.
Jordan Jr., who helped Lewinsky line up a job at Revlon and Hubbell obtain a
consulting contract with its parent company, MacAndrews & Forbes Holdings
Inc.
Hubbell, a former partner of Hillary Clinton and the late Vincent W. Foster
at the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock, might have information relevant to
several areas of Starr's wide-ranging Whitewater inquiry. For example,
Hubbell and Hillary Clinton were both involved in legal work connected to
the Castle Grande project, a large-scale land fraud scheme put together in
the 1980s by the late James B. McDougal, the Clintons' former Whitewater
business partner.
Starr has investigated whether Hillary Clinton testified truthfully about
her work on the project.
The new information about Hubbell's consulting payments was subpoenaed from
his clients by investigators for the House committee. The records show he
did little or no work for most of the $593,442 he received from 18 companies
and individuals, including $61,667 from HarperCollins for a book that was
never completed. Three trust accounts established to pay his family's living
expenses, education costs and his legal bills took in $110,710.
The House panel found Hubbell's consulting contracts would have paid him
more than $850,000 had most clients not ended their arrangements with him
when he entered his guilty plea in December 1994. His income after he left
his $123,000-a-year Justice post totaled $704,152. All the payments came in
1994 and early 1995, except the HarperCollins funds, which were in 1995 and
early 1996.
Hubbell's lawyer, John Nields, declined to comment yesterday on Hubbell's
income or the prospect of new charges being brought against his client. In a
memoir published last year, "Friends in High Places," Hubbell discussed his
consulting income and said "it wasn't hush money."
The House panel, chaired by Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), has been looking into
Hubbell's consulting fees as part of its investigation into campaign finance
irregularities. The Indonesia-based Lippo Group and its former employee,
ex-Democratic National Committee fund-raiser John Huang, have been important
figures in the campaign finance inquiry, and they were among those who came
to Hubbell's aid in June 1994.
A Lippo subsidiary paid Hubbell $100,000 on June 27, 1994, shortly after
receiving a request from Little Rock lawyer Douglas Buford, a former law
partner of both President Clinton and White House aide Bruce R. Lindsey.
Lippo owner James Riady also helped pay Hubbell's daughter's college tuition
while he was in jail, records gathered by the House committee show. A
company jointly owned by Riady and C. Joseph Giroir, a former Rose partner
of Hubbell's, contributed $12,000 to an education trust set up by Hubbell's
Little Rock accountant, Michael Schaufele.
On Dec. 7, 1995, Hubbell tried to tap Riady again. "Webb asked me to contact
you to see if James will help with Caroline's second semester tuition
payment. The trust has only received a small donation since your last
contribution," Schaufele wrote to Giroir in a letter obtained by the
committee. Giroir confirmed that he and Riady contributed $12,000 to the
trust but said they refused the second request.
In another new payment found by the House panel, Nicholas Stonnington, a
Merrill Lynch vice president in Los Angeles and Democratic Party
contributor, paid Hubbell $18,000 in August 1994. In a Feb. 10, 1995, letter
from Hubbell to Stonnington -- sent two months after Hubbell had entered his
guilty plea -- Hubbell promised to help Stonnington line up a federal
appointment.
Hubbell told Stonnington that Bob Nash, newly named head of White House
personnel, was an old friend from Arkansas. He urged Stonnington to consider
a short-term appointment, perhaps on a commission on the Internet. "This
would give you exposure with several people while we worked on the other
possibilities. I am putting that in motion as a possibility," he told
Stonnington.
Two companies that had competing interests in the telephone business, Sprint
Corp. and Pacific Telesis Group Inc., both hired Hubbell in the fall of 1994
to consult on a dispute between the Justice Department and the Federal
Communications Commission.
A source close to Pac-Tel said the company did not know Hubbell was working
for its competitor too. Records show he took in $112,000 from the two
companies.
© Copyright 1998 The Washington Post Company
99 percent of lawyers give the rest a bad name.
[EMAIL PROTECTED]
Subscribe/Unsubscribe, email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
In the body of the message enter: subscribe/unsubscribe law-issues
