-Caveat Lector-
Cisneros pleads guilty to charge of lying to FBI
Ex-HUD secretary avoids trial, prison but will pay $10,000 fine
09/08/99
By David Jackson and David LaGesse / The Dallas Morning News
WASHINGTON - Former Housing Secretary Henry Cisneros, avoiding a lengthy
trial that would intrude into his personal life, pleaded guilty Tuesday to a
single misdemeanor charge of lying to the FBI about payments to a former
mistress.
Ending a 4 1/2-year federal investigation that cost at least $10 million,
Mr. Cisneros agreed to pay a $10,000 fine but will serve no time in prison
or on probation.
"I regret my lack of candor and accept responsibility for my conduct," he
said in a written statement.
Mr. Cisneros, 52, a former mayor of San Antonio, is president of Univision,
a Los Angeles-based Spanish-language television network.
The plea bargain ends a case that critics had condemned as an abuse of the
independent counsel law and a trivial matter turning only on the amount of
money Mr. Cisneros paid his former paramour, Linda Medlar Jones.
U.S. District Judge Stanley Sporkin, who was ready to begin selecting a jury
in the federal trial, disagreed.
He stressed that Mr. Cisneros admitted under-reporting the amount during an
FBI background check before his Senate confirmation in 1993 as secretary of
housing and urban development.
"Nobody can be permitted to lie their way into public office," Judge Sporkin
said during a brief hearing Tuesday.
The judge, however, lamented the length and expense of the case.
"It took much too long to develop and much too long to bring to judgment
day," Judge Sporkin said. "This case should have been resolved a long time
ago, perhaps years ago."
President Clinton issued a statement Tuesday praising Mr. Cisneros.
"Henry has been a dedicated public official who served the American people
and this administration with distinction," Mr. Clinton said. "He is also a
good friend. I am pleased that this matter is finally behind him, and I wish
him and his family all the best."
Critics, however, called the judgment too lenient, especially because Ms.
Jones remains in a Fort Worth federal prison. She is serving a 42-month
sentence for a bank-fraud case also pursued by the independent counsel,
David Barrett.
Ms. Jones's attorney, Sam Ogan, said Mr. Cisneros' attorneys got the better
deal.
"What a fat hog they have cut," Mr. Ogan said. "That means that every day
that Linda serves is an injustice."
Asked whether the plea bargain is too lenient, Mr. Barrett said, "It's very
tough to put a man and his wife and child through a trial like this."
Citing an agreement between prosecutors and defense attorneys not to discuss
the case, Mr. Barrett said, "We're just glad to have this over and done
with."
Once a rising star
For Mr. Cisneros, the hearing capped a controversy that had derailed a
promising political career. A rising Democratic star, Mr. Cisneros was a
leading contender to become the party's vice presidential candidate in 1984.
As San Antonio mayor in 1988, he acknowledged a relationship with Ms. Jones,
a political fund-raiser who at that time went by her married name of Medlar.
He already had said he would step out of public life.
The relationship ended in 1989. Mr. Cisneros said he began making payments
to Ms. Jones because she said the publicity surrounding the affair had
crippled her business.
In 1992, President Clinton asked Mr. Cisneros to join his new Cabinet, and
his political prospects brightened again. It was during the standard
background check that the affair with Ms. Jones resurfaced.
As part of the plea bargain, Mr. Cisneros acknowledged telling the FBI in
January 1993 that he paid Ms. Medlar about $2,500 at a time. In fact, he had
made higher payments, including a pair of $8,000 payments the month before.
Prosecutors said Mr. Cisneros paid Ms. Jones $264,500 over four years.
Mr. Barrett's office secured an 18-count indictment against Mr. Cisneros in
December 1997, accusing him and others of a plot to play down the payments
to improve his chances at confirmation. Mr. Cisneros denied the charges.
During the hearing Tuesday, he told Judge Sporkin he could not recall the
payment amounts during the FBI interview and had wanted to protect Ms.
Jones' privacy.
Prosecutor Larry Scalise, however, stressed to the court that Mr. Cisneros
was admitting guilt because "the statement was false [and] Mr. Cisneros knew
it was false."
In his written statement, Mr. Cisneros said: "I was not candid with the FBI
about a personal matter.
"I hope that all who follow me in public service learn the lesson that truth
and candor are important in the process of selecting our leaders."
Expensive proposition
Mr. Cisneros, who resigned as housing secretary in early 1997, noted that
none of the accusations involved his duties in the Cabinet.
The investigation has cost at least $10 million, according to reports from
the General Accounting Office. Mr. Barrett had spent $8.7 million as of
Sept. 30, 1998, according to the latest GAO report.
Critics of Mr. Barrett's investigation said the independent counsel law gave
lawyers unlimited time and money to investigate even trivial cases.
Mr. Barrett declined to comment, but Judge Sporkin defended him by saying,
"I don't think the Office of Independent Counsel had much choice in this
matter."
Ms. Jones was to testify in Mr. Cisneros' trial, but only after a legal
dispute that sent her to prison.
The independent counsel reached an agreement in 1995 for Ms. Jones'
cooperation. Prosecutors later said Ms. Jones violated that agreement by
saying she had provided original tape recordings of telephone conversations
with Mr. Cisneros even though some had been edited.
Prosecutors reached a new agreement with Ms. Jones this year after she had
been sentenced to prison in the bank-fraud case.
"I expect the independent counsel to move to reduce her term," Mr. Ogan
said. "She is no danger to the community."
The federal investigation began after Ms. Jones played telephone tapes for a
1994 television program that looked at a lawsuit she had filed against Mr.
Cisneros after he stopped the payments.
On the show, Ms. Jones said Mr. Cisneros had misled the FBI.
The Justice Department opened an investigation that led to the appointment
of Mr. Barrett as independent counsel in 1995.
Mr. Barrett prosecuted Ms. Jones for bank fraud involving a Lubbock home
loan. A grand jury indicted her along with her sister and brother-in-law,
Patsy and Allen Wooten of Lubbock.
The three agreed to plead guilty on the eve of their bank-fraud trial in
January. Ms. Jones received a 42-month sentence and has served about 18
months. The Wootens await sentencing.
Federal prosecutors pursued the bank-fraud case to win the cooperation of
Ms. Jones and the Wootens, said Rod Hobson, a Lubbock attorney for Mr.
Wooten.
"It was the old squeeze play to get Henry Cisneros," Mr. Hobson said.
The Cisneros trial was delayed partly by prosecutors' dispute with Ms. Jones
and because of a defense effort to exclude Ms. Jones' tapes. Judge Sporkin
ruled in July that the tapes could be used.
http://www.dallasmorningnews.com/national/0908nat99cisneros.htm
Bard
Federal Government defined:
....a benefit/subsidy protection racket!
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