-Caveat Lector-
[There's really no reason to have Clinton testify. He'd just say, that he
didn't recall,"
or just out-right lie. I mean, Duh! --MS]
http://www.newsmax.com/showinsidecover.shtml?a=2001/6/10/220402
NewsMax
Sunday, June 10, 2001 11:02 p.m. EDT
Bush Justice Department Putting the Brakes on Pardongate Probe?
A lawyer for key Pardongate witness Garland Lincecum confirmed Sunday that
his client gave damning testimony to a federal grand jury in New York last
week about former first brother Roger Clinton's role in the
clemency-for-cash scandal.
But federal prosecutors have reached the point where ex-President Clinton's
testimony may be necessary to lock up the case, a step the Bush Justice
Department may be reluctant to take.
"Essentially my client went in there and he said, 'Look, myself and my
family paid this money to associates of Roger Clinton - and, in his
opinion, to Roger Clinton - so he could get a pardon from the president,"
lawyer Ed Hayes told WABC Radio's John Batchelor and Paul Alexander.
The radio duo broke the story of the former first brother's alleged
pardon-peddling scam in February, prompting U.S. Attorney for New York's
Southern District Mary Jo White to launch a federal criminal probe.
Hayes said Lincecum testified that he paid $235,000 to Clinton's partners
Dickie Morton and George Locke, one of whom, the grand jury was told, "had
a long-term relationship with the president as well."
In the 1980s, Locke, a former Arkansas state senator, was a partner in the
Little Rock investment company Collins, Locke and Lasater. Dan Lasater was
one of Bill Clinton's biggest financial supporters during his early
political career - and when the bond dealer was later sent to jail on
cocaine conspiracy charges, Clinton gave him a state pardon.
Locke, who was jailed along with Roger Clinton as part of the same 1985
drug prosecution, told the Wall Street Journal earlier this year that he
expected, but didn't get, his own pardon when President Clinton pardoned
Roger this past January.
Lincecum testified, said Hayes, that Roger Clinton's partners told him they
expected "the president would give Roger at least six pardons -
they had six pardons to sell."
Hayes outlined two possible crimes suggested by the evidence thus far:
"One is that Roger took the money and didn't do anything for it. Or,
alternatively - and this would be a much more serious crime - if the
president did say to him, 'Look, I'm going to give you six pardons. Get
the most money that you can for them. Tell me who to pardon and I'll
pardon them.'"
But government attorneys may have reached a crossroads in the Clinton case,
the New York lawyer suggested - telling Batchelor and Alexander that it's
no longer a question of whether the evidence is strong enough to bring
indictments, but whether the Bush Justice Department wants to go after the
Clintons.
"The big issue now is does the government want to press the case.
Because, for one thing, to really show whether or not there was a crime
committed, you really have to question Bill Clinton. You really have to
ask, Did Roger talk to his brother Bill about getting a pardon for Garland?
Did Roger talk to anybody about getting a pardon for Garland?"
Hayes declined to offer his opinion about which way prosecutors were
leaning, but hinted they were being reined in on orders from Washington.
"You never know in these cases how dedicated they are to making the case.
... I think [lead Pardongate prober] Elliot Jacobson is a very
conscientious prosecutor. But he does what he can do within the Justice
Department."
When pressed by Batchelor and Alexander, Hayes elaborated on signals that
prosecutors are cooling on the idea of indicting the former first brother.
"I don't think they have any particular commitment to showing that Roger
Clinton is a crook. I think most of the country accepts that - I don't
know if that's what they want to devote their resources to."
That could mean the Bush administration will decide to use Clinton's case
as a bargaining chip with the new Democrat-controlled Senate, the lawyer
said.
"You have a much different atmosphere now. Charles Schumer and Hillary
Clinton are the senators from New York. Charles Schumer is a very powerful
individual because the Democrats now control the Senate."
Hayes hinted a political deal may be in the works: "You don't know whether
[the Bush administration] is going to trade three federal judicial
appointments in return for turning a blind eye to this."
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