Sue Hartigan <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
Paula Jones' News Conference
April 16, 1998
JONES: Hello. Thanks for coming out today.
As you know, two weeks ago the court in Little
Rock surprisingly dismissed my case. I was
shocked.
(CRYING)
(UNKNOWN): Take your time.
JONES: I'm sorry. I was shocked because I
believed that what Mr. Clinton did to me was wrong
and that the law protects women who are subjected
to that kind of abuse of power.
Within a few days, I consulted my attorneys, who
gave me advice about a possible appeal. I believe
that the grounds for a possible appeal are very
strong. I have faith in my attorneys' advice. And I
know that they have my best interests in mind.
But there was something else I had to consider -- my
husband and my two sweet little boys. I had to
consider the stress on my family. So I have taken
some time in deciding whether to continue what I
have fought for so long to obtain, which is justice
and
my day in court.
I have also considered the fact that the court's
ruling
affects many women other than myself.
Despite the continuing personal strain on my family
and me, in the end, I have not come this far to see
the law let men who have done such things dodge
their responsibility.
They should not be able to abuse their positions of
power at the expense of female employees. And I
do not believe, when this suit is over, that my case
will merely show that people in power can get away.
Therefore, I have decided to appeal the court's
decision. With the assistance of my attorneys at the
Rutherford Institute and the support of my friends
and many people across America, I am confident
that the area (ph) -- (ph) Eighth Circuit Court will
rule that my case should heard by a jury.
That is all I ever sought, and I will continue to seek
that simple right.
Thank you.
CAMPBELL: Thank you all for coming. We
appreciate you turning out on a beautiful afternoon
like this in Dallas, Texas.
I'm going to start by introducing the remainder of our
legal team, the people that could attend anyway.
On my far left here is Jim Fisher. You know, the
plaintiff and her husband. Mr. John Whitehead, here,
the president of the Rutherford Institute. David Pike,
one of my law partners. And then McCord Wilson
(ph) is another one of our lawyers on the far end.
I'm going to start by reading a short statement and
then I will open it up for some questions and
answers. We're probably just going to go 10 or 12
minutes, maybe 15. If the questions start to run out,
then we'll leave.
My partners and I are proud to represent Paula
Jones and look forward to working to reverse the
erroneous decision of the Arkansas federal court in
this case.
Mr. Fisher, Mr. Pike, and the rest of our lawyers are
also looking forward to participating in this appeal.
We do not think that the law permits a male
supervisor to expose himself to his female
subordinates and ask for sexual favors. There is no
one-free-flash rule recognized in the law. Therefore,
we believe the dismissal of Mrs. Jones' case was
erroneous and will be reversed.
Mr. Clinton has reportedly said that he wanted a
trial, but he has consistently directly his legal team
to
avoid and delay any trial in this case. We will
continue to fight to bring out the truth about Mr.
Clinton and what he did to Mrs. Jones. We expect
and look forward to winning a speedy reversal of
this decision and to letting a jury decide who is
truly
responsible here.
After the Q&A session, we do have a press release
prepared with a copy of the text of Mrs. Jones'
statement attached to the back of it so after we've
finished, feel free to come up and Ms. Carpenter-
McMillan will pass those out.
If you could please, do me the courtesy of identifying
yourself when I call on you and what media source
you're with. I will appreciate that.
Yes, sir.
QUESTION: I'd like to ask you, sir, you talk about
these (OFF- MIKE), what is the (OFF-MIKE) you
would apply and (OFF-MIKE)?
CAMPBELL: Our best guess is that the 8th Circuit
appellate level will probably take between six
months and year. It could be shorter. It could be
longer. But that's a pretty good average estimated
time.
Yes, ma'am.
QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE)
CAMPBELL: Yes. We will reveal some of those
and those are in our -- summarized in our press
release. The starting point, of course, is just to go
to
our summary judgment brief and read that. That will
tell you 70 to 80 percent of the legal issues that we
intend to appeal.
But there are four of them off the top of my head that
we think are significant.
The section 1983 civil rights action. We believe
that's very significant, and we think there are three
areas that are questionable in the court's opinion on
that. One is whether you need any kind of damages
at all other than emotional damages. The second
subpart of that is whether tangible job detriments
have to be shown or have been shown in this case.
The third part of that is whether we have shown
hostile work environment.
Second main point is section 1985. That's another
civil rights cause of action. We feel that the court's
opinion and our opposition's briefs on that point are
weak. Third point is the tort of outrage, or
intentional
infliction of emotional distress. We think that the
opinion is also deficient on that point.
And then finally, the fourth main point is the -- our
last section of our brief deals extensively with what
we believe to be the suppression of evidence or
obstruction of justice campaign that has been
indulged by the defendant in this case.
And we think that the authorities on that issue are
very clear that that is equivalent to the legal
admission that Mr. Clinton's entire case is weak and
unfounded. And that should have been considered in
the court's opinion on ruling on the motion for
summary judgment. We think that the court's opinion
and our opposition's brief on that particular point
are
particularly vulnerable. They cited no authorities
contrary to the authorities that we cited. So those
are
going to be the four main points.
Yes, ma'am.
QUESTION: Where is the money going to come
from to finance the appeal? And are you concerned
that some of the fund-raising sources will dry up,
giving your setback (OFF-MIKE)?
CAMPBELL: I'm going to let Mr. Whitehead
address that.
There are some of your questions, I'm sure, that are
going to be more apropos to be addressed by Mr.
Whitehead, so I'll ask him to step up here
occasionally.
That's one of them.
John.
WHITEHEAD: Yes. The Rutherford Institute will
finance the appeal. And again, as we've said all
along, we will support the case, whatever's needed,
because we think there's a very key human rights,
women's rights issue here. And also, do I think the
fund-raising sources will dry up?
Well, that's possible, but that's not something we
would rely on in terms of pursuing the appeal. And
so we're in it for the long haul, no matter what it
costs.
CAMPBELL: Yes, ma'am.
QUESTION: Is Richard Mellon Scaife financing or
a contributor to the Rutherford Institute?
CAMPBELL: I'm sorry. I didn't hear the name.
QUESTION: Is Richard Mellon Scaife a
contributor?
CAMPBELL: I have no idea. I doubt that seriously,
but you can ask Mr. Whitehead.
WHITEHEAD: No.
(LAUGHTER)
CAMPBELL: Is that clear enough?
Yes, ma'am.
QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE) from a (OFF-MIKE)
time, given that the president is likely to be out of
office by the time this case is resolved, to what
degree does that -- the value (OFF-MIKE)? I
mean, what do you stand to gain here by the fact --
considering the fact that he probably will be out of
office?
CAMPBELL: Well, I've got at least two responses
to that. The first one is he will not necessarily be
out
office when this case is hopefully called to trial. It
is
entirely possible that even if an appeal or
certificate
or writ of cert is sought from the Supreme Court,
that that can all be resolved within two years.
So I disagree that it's a necessary conclusion that he
will be out of office.
Even if he is out of office, however, if you study the
pleadings in this case, you will see that Mr. Clinton
has been sued individually and personally, not as
president. So we frankly don't care whether he is
president of the United States or busing tables at
Lubee's (ph) cafeteria when this lawsuit comes to
trial. The legal issues are still the same.
I believe it's safe to say that my client is not in
this for
media attention.
She's certainly not in it for the abuse that she has
had
to suffer for the last four years. So we don't care
what Mr. Clinton -- what position he occupies at the
time this case comes to trial.
Yes, sir.
QUESTION: (OFF-MIKE) here in Dallas. I
wonder if you could talk a little bit about her
emotional state and the concern over the (OFF-
MIKE) -- since she's not allowed to answer these
questions -- how it has been for her over the past
year but (ph) the dismissal from the court.
CAMPBELL: Well, if your questions involves just
the last two weeks, basically, after the dismissal, I
think it's safe to say without breaching any
attorney-client privileges that she was shocked and
dismayed and upset for the first couple of days after
the decision came down.
She recovered from that very well, I believe, and has
been able to deal quite rationally with her attorneys
in the mean time, study all the various legal aspects
and legal issues that would be involved in an appeal,
and also very rationally consider the toll on her
husband and her children and the entire family, as
well as her close friends, as to whether carrying
forward with the case and the appeal would be
worth that continuing toll.
So that's a summary, I think, of how she has reacted
in the last two weeks.
Yes, ma'am.
QUESTION: Would you accept any kind of a
settlement from this point forward? And how's your
client going to -- make a living between now and the
time that it takes (OFF-MIKE)?
CAMPBELL: Well, I'll address your legal question.
I'm not sure I'm capable of addressing your second
question.
Legal question is what about settlement. Our position
is and always has been in this case that all ethical
attorneys are duty-bound to consider any legitimate
settlement offer that is made, and are duty-bound to
engage in rational settlement discussions.
The problem in this case so far has been there
haven't been any rational settlement discussions and
no rational settlement offers from the other side. So
if
some adult in control of the other side of this case
would like to come forward and make a rational
settlement offer, or even agree to engage in rational
settlement discussions, such as a formal mediation,
for example, we will certainly be open to that.
And if a reasonable settlement can result from that,
then we as lawyers would recommend that to our
client. Whether that's going to happen, I have no
idea. You'd have to address that question to the
White House.
In terms of living between now and then, that's not
my area of expertise. We're not dealing with those
issues. We're just dealing with the issues in this
case
so I can't answer that question.
Yes, ma'am.
QUESTION: When did your firm decide to
continue with this case? What day? Where? And did
you have any misgivings, any questions about
continuing with it?
CAMPBELL: Our firm decided to go forward with
the appeal when the final decision was made by our
client yesterday evening.
In terms of did we have any questions or
reservations about going forward, we have no
questions or reservations about going forward from a
legal standpoint. We think the case is strong for
reversal of this judgment. The only reservations we
might have had involved personal ones concerning
the stress and strain on Paula and her husband and
her family and her children, and that's not really a
legal decision. That's a personal decision.
Yes, sir.
QUESTION: Without giving us a filing date
(OFF-MIKE) can you discuss a bit of what went
on, the give and take, the ups and downs? Were
there moments that either Paula Jones or yourself
(OFF-MIKE) reports of saying let's not continue?
CAMPBELL: Well, I can't tell you much about the
discussions yesterday because they are
attorney-client privileged. I can tell you that the
discussions yesterday were not really about the legal
pros and cons of going forward with the case. We
have already covered that with our client for the last
two weeks.
Yesterday mainly involved going through what
unfortunately is a fact of life, and that's a very
detailed engagement agreement. And whenever a
lawyer represents a client, there has to be an
engagement agreement in writing, and unfortunately,
those are usually long papers. And so we got to
traipse through long papers yesterday. And there
weren't really any ups and downs, it was just a
straight through progression of going over legal
documents.
--
Two rules in life:
1. Don't tell people everything you know.
2.
Subscribe/Unsubscribe, email: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
In the body of the message enter: subscribe/unsubscribe law-issues
