More bad news for Starr:
Judge Dismisses Indictment Against Hubbell
WASHINGTON (AllPolitics, July 1) -- A federal judge dismissed the tax
evasion indictment against former Justice Department official and presidential
friend Webster Hubbell, and Hubbell's wife Suzanna.
U.S. District Judge James Robertson said a Hubbell motion seeking dismissal
"will be granted."
The judge's decision is a stunning setback for Whitewater Independent Counsel
Ken Starr whose office brought the charges of tax evasion, conspiracy and mail
fraud against the Hubbells last April.
Presiding over a preliminary hearing last Friday on this matter, Robertson
characterized legal reasoning by one of Starr's prosecutors as "scary."
At the hearing John Nields, Hubbell's lawyer, said the charges should be
dismissed because some of the records used by Starr's prosecutors to
substantiate the charges were obtained under an earlier immunity agreement
between the independent prosecutor and Hubbell.
"If they compelled it under immunity, they have to hold him harmless. That's the
rule," Nields said.
But prosecutor Stephen Binhak asserted that the prosecution had the right to
use the records to press new charges, as long as the findings could be
independently verified and the jury was not told that Hubbell had provided the
documents himself.
Robertson told Binhak he found that line of reasoning "scary" and stated that
Starr's office was "asserting a government power" in pressing charges on
information culled from documents provided by Hubbell under the earlier
agreement.
Hubbell, who appeared in court Friday morning with his wife and daughter, at
first refused to turn over his business records on Fifth Amendment grounds. But
he eventually turned them over when the prosecutors offered him limited
immunity.
Hubbell has been a major figure in the Whitewater investigation. As Hillary
Clinton's former partner at the Rose Law Firm, prosecutors suspect he has
information about Mrs. Clinton's involvement in a related land deal that also
involved Hubbell's father-in-law. Prosecutors also suspect that Hubbell took
sensitive documents from the firm in order to protect the Clintons.
Prosecutors claim that Hubbell and his wife, who has also been indicted, tried
to avoid paying taxes on money that Clinton supporters gave them, allegedly in
return for silence in the Whitewater investigation. The records Hubbell turned
over to the prosecution showed that he left some consulting fees off of his tax
returns, evidence which the prosecutors say supports their charges.
Some of the fees in question are said to come from James Riady, the
Indonesian banker with controversial ties to the Clinton administration.
Hubbell is also suspected of writing off personal expenses and hiding assets. In
all, he is charged with owing $895,000 in federal and state taxes and fines. |
