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To: Jan Crawley who wrote (36984)	3/1/1998 9:52:00 PM
From: Glenn D. Rudolph	Read Replies (1) \| Respond to of 61433

****OT**** P.I. firm hired by Clinton defense team known for political hardball By Bill Sammon THE WASHINGTON TIMES he private-detective agency hired by President Clinton's defense team to discredit independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr is a rough-and-tumble collection of political hardball players with A-list connections to the White House. Although administration officials suggest Investigative Group International (IGI) has done little more than disseminate newspaper articles critical of Mr. Starr and his lieutenants, the firm has gathered salacious material in its probes of other high-profile targets, The Washington Times has learned. One former IGI investigator who now works for the Clinton administration played a key role in efforts to -- Continued from Front Page -- derail the Supreme Court nominations of Robert Bork and Clarence Thomas. Another former IGI investigator said the firm sought evidence of extramarital affairs, homosexuality and pedophilia against prominent businesses figures. Other ex-employees said IGI sometimes skirts the law in its investigative techniques, using undercover operatives to perform questionable tasks, such as gathering credit information on people without their permission. One former IGI investigator said the firm has been known to sift through the trash of those under scrutiny. "Garbage is very good --you'd be surprised what people throw out," the investigator said. "Some clients think picking through trash is unseemly, but others recognize it as a perfectly legal technique in most cities. I mean, the FBI uses it without a warrant." Another former IGI investigator described the firm as ruthless, taking its cue from Terry F. Lenzner, its founder and chairman. "I'm just afraid of him," said the ex-employee. "He's not a nice guy all the time. On some things about Terry, I'm a fan. But all investigators can be aggressive. That's why people hire us. So I'm just nervous about that." Mr. Lenzner, who served as assistant chief counsel for the Senate Watergate Committee from 1973 to 1975, founded IGI in 1984. With offices in London, Frankfurt, Germany, and five major cities in the United States, the Washington-based firm is now among the most sophisticated private-investigation companies in the world, Mr. Lenzner told Senate lawyers last year. "Many people come to us looking for getting accurate information in a complex case," he said. "I'd say 90 percent of our investigations are conducted under requirements or requests that the targets of the inquiry not know that the investigation is being conducted." Such discretion is occasionally compromised. This week, the White House conceded IGI has been working for Mr. Clinton's personal attorneys to defend him in the Monica Lewinsky sex-and-lies case and the Paula Jones sexual-harassment lawsuit. "There's no investigation going on about the private lives of the people at issue," said IGI lawyer Howard Shapiro. "The terms of this retention were very specific -- or were very carefully circumscribed and defined by the lawyers -- and excluded any investigating into personal lives." While insisting IGI's techniques are strictly aboveboard in the Clinton case, Mr. Shapiro said confidentiality arrangements preclude him from discussing the techniques that are being employed. Former IGI investigator Michael Moroney doubted that the firm's role is limited to such relatively benign tasks as gathering negative news clippings on Mr. Starr and his assistants. "Any law firm can use a computer to pull up newspaper articles in a New York minute," he said. "You don't need IGI to do that. You need IGI to do other things." Mr. Moroney said IGI, like most private-detective firms, often conducts investigations by "looking for any dirt, anything to impeach the credibility" of the targets. "I'm not making any value judgments. That's just the way it's done," he said. Mr. Lenzner did not return phone calls. But Mr. Shapiro echoed the sentiments of several former IGI investigators, who said Mr. Lenzner's background as a lawyer makes him more leery of questionable investigative techniques than most private eyes. "That's one of the selling points of the firm," Mr. Shapiro said. "And he's not just any lawyer. He's a Harvard-educated lawyer with a background of being a federal prosecutor in the Southern District of New York, which many --not just its alumni -- consider the pre-eminent office in the country. "He's the sort of person who will ensure that the private-investigative work that is done at his firm is not only of a very high quality in terms of its investigations, but ensure that it in no way crosses any ethical or legal or moral boundaries," said Mr. Shapiro, who quit his job as FBI general counsel after an internal probe found he exercised poor judgment in the FBI files scandal, in which White House aides gathered information about officials with the Reagan and Bush administrations. Mr. Lenzner's tenure as head of IGI has not been without its embarrassing missteps. In early 1996, for example, he did not respond to many phone calls and e-mail messages from one of his employees, Susan Swanson, the first investigator to obtain evidence that the Unabomber was a hitherto unknown hermit named Theodore Kaczynski. A skeptical IGI President Raymond W. Kelly reluctantly agreed to review Miss Swanson's evidence. But by the time Mr. Kelly responded, Miss Swanson had resorted to turning over the case to an outside lawyer. IGI had missed out on the Unabomber case. Last year, IGI's proposal to dig up dirt on Sen. Don Nickles and his wife resulted in an angry confrontation when Mr. Lenzner appeared before the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee. "I don't mind you messing with me," the Oklahoma Republican told him. "But I sure mind you messing with my family." Mr. Lenzner's proposal was designed to help Cheyenne-Arapaho Indians reclaim tribal lands from the Interior Department.