Whitewater update, June 1999. |
Starr Report
Analysis |
IF Ken Starr and Kathleen Willey had their way, Julie Hiatt Steele would
spend the next 35 years of her life in prison, simply because she had the courage to tell the truth.
Now that Kathleen Willey is on the talk show circuit, she is exposing her true self and the portrait
is less than flattering. Kathleen Willey is a sick woman. On the one hand, she claims that she understands why Julie Hiatt
Steele lied, and on the other, she urges Ken Starr to continue to pursue Steele on the absurd allegation that Steele
obstructed justice. Where does that level of cruelty reside? Why is Kathleen Willey publicly promoting the determination to
destroy Steele? In the final analysis, it would be naive to claim that Kathleen Willey is anything beyond one of Ken Starr's
many victims, turned predator. Facing a financial crisis of the sort that Susan McDougal encountered, [both women had
husbands whose financial dealings were on the cross hairs of a highly magnified, merciless microscope] Kathleen Willey had a
choice. She could choose to tell the truth and to refuse to cooperate with Ken Starr's Inquisition, or she could choose to be
one of his predators. She chose to be his predator and received immunity from prosecution. The emotional trauma of her
husband's alleged suicide provided the Starr camp the opportunity to manipulate a desperate woman, and the fact that she has
been exhaustively brainwashed is abundantly clear. In her own words: "I think that Ken Starr and the people in his Office are
very professional. I think that Ken Starr is a very honorable man and I had nothing but good rapport with them and the FBI
agents, all of them -I can't say enough about them." Perhaps, when Kathleen Willey takes the time to consider the treatment
that Susan McDougal's husband received at the hands of the Office of the Independent Counsel, she will re-evaluate her blind
loyalty. In particular, did her husband really commit suicide, or was he simply one of the many victim of the massive, well
financed, covert operation to destroy the President? In the final analysis, we cannot prove that Ed Willey’s death was simply
one of the sinister improvisations of the obsessive plot to destroy Clinton, but the mere fact that such a horrid thought is
plausible, is in itself disgusting. Clearly, the plight of the McDougal and the Steele families have all the earmarks of a
merciless Inquisition, and in that respect, the suicide of Ed Willey was as convenient as the death of Vincent Foster -they
both advanced the interests of the anti-Clinton Inquisition. [posted June 1999]
It is an absolute and total outrage
when corrupted people like Kathleen Willey are encouraged to lie with impunity
while people like Julie Hiatt Steele are
targeted with the purpose of destroying them, because they refuse to lie about President Bill Clinton. In her own words, this
is Julie Hiatt Steele's story, and you can rest assured, that if every single syllable was not absolutely unchallangeable,
Ken Starr would have produced a semen-stained dress to disprove it. This statement by Julie Hiatt Steele is dated September
23, 1999:
My name is Julie Hiatt Steele. I have lived in Richmond, Virginia for the past twenty-one years. Next month I
will be fifty-three years old. I am the mother of four children, three surviving, and the grandmother of two. Divorced in
1984, I became the single parent of my youngest child, Adam, when I adopted him in Romania in 1990. He was ten weeks old when
I found him; we recently celebrated his ninth birthday.
I have never committed a crime -- I have never even been cited for
a traffic violation. I had no political history, connections, or agenda in 1997. I voted for George Bush in 1992 and did not
vote in 1996, a mistake I have no intention of repeating. I have never met, nor have I spoken with, the President, Mrs.
Clinton, Paula Jones, Monica Lewinsky, Linda Tripp, or Ken Starr. I have no friends working in the White House and I have
never been employed by the government. I have never been to the White House, even as a tourist. I certainly have never been
threatened by the White House or by anyone associated with the White House.
My family and I have learned that this is not
the country we thought we lived in. I have been humiliated and bullied; I have been persecuted and ultimately prosecuted, by
Kenneth Starr and the OIC for refusing to corroborate Kathleen Willey's claim that President Clinton groped her. I also have
been financially destroyed. I lost my job, and have been unable to work. I am now losing a home I once owned free and clear.
Letters, email, and small defense fund contributions from across the country have been, and still are, a lifeline.
Americans have been generous in their support and with their concern. Together we ponder how this could possibly have
happened to me, privately they acknowledge it could have happened to any one of them. In our country? None of us thought so
at one time...
I have thought a great deal about the day that changed my life forever. It must have been a normal day, a
day filled with routine, pleasant, irritating, and joyous moments. Just an ordinary day, not recognized for the treasure it
was, passed over in quest of some rare and perfect tomorrow.
I do recall one part of that day with absolute clarity, and
with regret. Honoring her last minute request, I did a favor for Kathleen Willey and trusted a reporter. In opening the door
to Michael Isikoff I literally stepped in front of a freight train. It was a train ultimately controlled by Kenneth Starr and
loaded with all the power and financial resources of the United States Government. It became known as "Criminal No. 99-9A." I
never even saw it coming...
That seemingly normal day in March 1997 changed my life forever. Rushed, and worried about
running late to pick Adam up, with the reporter en route to my house, Kathy Willey asked me to lie to him. I was to say that
she had told me that the President groped her. I made a big mistake by taking the path of least resistance, by lying for
someone I thought was my friend. Although Willey and Isikoff had told me it would be "off-the-record," months later I learned
he now wanted to print it. I called him and told him the truth -- a truth that earned me no favors, no fortune and no glory.
Following his August 1997 article, with both the truth and Kathy's lie:
*On February 13, 1998, I provided an
affidavit to President Clinton's attorneys in Jones v. Clinton. I explained what I had done. I did so believing then, as now,
that it was the right thing to do. I was relieved that I could finally, in my own words, set the record straight.
*In
late February my former attorneys were contacted by producers from Sixty Minutes. The producers claimed to have been told
that my son's adoption was illegal. Much later we learned that Kathy Willey was the source of this despicable allegation.
Adam was, in fact, legally adopted in Romania in 1990, and in the United States in 1991. And Kathy Willey knew that.
*On
March 10, 1998, FBI agents with the OIC appeared at my door. They announced that they needed to speak with me for a few
minutes about Willey. On the advice of counsel, we agreed to meet in my attorney's office later that same day. I willingly
met with the OIC. I was not concerned when my attorney left me alone with federal agents for several hours. As my attorney
pointed out, I was innocent of wrong doing, not accused of any crime, and of course, was telling the truth.
*I had no
idea that the OIC had already met with Kathy Willey. I had no idea that they had granted her transactional immunity before
even talking to her, let alone talking to me. In fact, Willey was testifying in the grand jury as I was being questioned by
Ken Starr's agents in Richmond. Telling the truth to agents that day would result in one count of "false statements" in my
indictment; they alleged that I lied when I said Willey never told me about the so-called grope.
*On June 11, 1998, I
testified before the grand jury in the District of Columbia. I did so with assurance, written and verbal, that I was there
only as a witness. I was told that I was not the subject of investigation, and that if I asserted the fifth amendment, it
would be challenged because there was no basis for it. Four prosecutors were in the grand jury, including Jackie Bennett,
whose role was simply to glare at me. The majority of questions related to Michael Isikoff; not Willey. Later my repeating to
that grand jury at the OIC's request, that Willey had never told me about the so-called grope would become an obstruction of
justice count in my indictment.
*I was excused at the end of the day. Believing that the matter was over for me, I
publicly apologized to the First Family for lying for Willey and filed a lawsuit against Isikoff and Newsweek Magazine that
same day.
*The OIC's pressure tactics began immediately. FBI agents made numerous visits to Richmond. The OIC subpoenaed
my credit report and reviewed documents relating to my 1984 divorce.
*In July, I was called to a different grand jury in
Virginia and was lied to about the reason for the venue change. I was informed, again in writing and contrary to the previous
OIC statement, that I was a subject of investigation and always had been. My new counsel told me to assert the fifth
amendment but when I tried to do so, I was bullied into answering the same question I been asked by the FBI agents and in
front of the D.C. grand jury, and I gave the same answer: that Willey had asked me to lie. That was the fourth count in the
indictment, yet another count of obstruction of justice.
*The OIC examined every check I have ever written. They obtained
copies of every possible financial transaction from original application to actual credit card account, they combed through
all of my records.
*Nothing was sacred, nothing was private, not even my lock box with my son's death certificate and
Adam's adoption paperwork was out of bounds. They took possession of my original tax records dating back to 1991. My CPA was
called before the Grand Jury on two occasions and was even questioned about our medical expenses.
*I later learned they
began capturing records of all incoming and outgoing phone calls the same day FBI agents came to my door, March 10, 1998
(even though I was not then a subject of the investigation). Local and long distance calls were tracked thus providing the
OIC with names and phone numbers of calls both made and received. My long distance phone records, dating as far back as
possible, were subpoenaed and analyzed.
*Friends and former friends, acquaintances and strangers, were confronted by FBI
Agents at their doors. In one case, a woman Kathy Willey swore was my best friend, Adam's baby-sitter, and my former
employee, was terrorized for forty-five minutes before she was told why they had come to her house. She had never taken care
of Adam, worked for me, been my best friend, or heard of me. We have, in fact, never met. Friends, family, acquaintances,
former employers, and people I did not think I knew were paraded before the grand jury. In more than one case entire families
were brought to the grand jury.
*That I had never met some of these people seemed As irrelevant as the truth had
become.
My family members were also called to the grand jury. My brother testified, as did one of my
daughters. He was asked about Adam's adoption in the grand jury. My attorney told me that she has never in all of her years,
as both a federal prosecutor and as a criminal defense attorney, witnessed these kind of abuses. For example, a neighbor,
also called to testify because he had once dated my daughter, was asked if he had sex with me.
And always, always,
sprinkled throughout their questioning in testimony and in their "home visits," the suggestion was made by the OIC that
Adam's adoption might not be legal. Not surprisingly, friends who traditionally joined our family for Christmas dinner
canceled for 1998. They feared Ken Starr and were afraid to be seen at my house. Other friends stopped me in crowded public
places to express concern, to whisper their fears of Ken Starr, and to explain and to apologize for their lack of
communication. Richmonders were afraid to call the house, afraid to invite us to their homes, afraid to even send a note
through the mail.
Adam, who lived through this nightmare with me, has endured assaults and despicable allegations about his
adoption that no child should ever be called upon to tolerate. Nightmares became his norm and my own. Adam has not been
invited to a birthday party since my indictment. At age eight, he has spent more than twenty-five percent of his life caught
in a national drama that continues to be painful and to defy logic.
Where was justice? My lawyer wrote to Janet Reno
several times - questioning Starr's jurisdiction to investigate me, his conflict of interest in investigating Jones v.
Clinton, and his repeated failure to follow Department of Justice policy. She did not respond. My lawyer filed pleadings with
the Chief Judge of the District of Columbia, challenging Ken Starr's Rule 6e violations. She did not rule.
And where was
Congress? As ordinary citizens cowered in fear of an American Gestapo, why did we not see outrage? Are partisan politics more
important than right and wrong? Are partisan politics more important than the individual rights of the citizens you were
elected to represent? This was not "rocket science," Ken Starr's abuse of authority was blatant and horrifying. Although I
contacted both of my Senators last winter. To date, neither Senator Robb nor Senator Warner has returned my calls.
And
where was the press? They say that we are "scandal weary," but they miss the point if they fail to understand that we never
cared about Monica or her blue dress. We do care about privacy and individual rights, his, hers, and ours. We do care that a
monster was unleashed and that some of us have learned how it feels to live in terror. We do care that our elected
representatives remained on their opposite sides of the aisle, refusing to stop him.
My "crime" was not only calling a liar
a liar, it was speaking out about what the OIC was doing to me. After going on Larry King Live, the pressure increased; the
day Anthony Lewis wrote about me in the New York Times, I was told I was a target; and when the OIC wanted to keep all the
information they were giving me a discovery secret, they said that they feared I would tell the press.
Ken Starr knew his
star witness against President Clinton, Kathleen Willey, was a liar. Here's what he knew:
*Ken Starr knew that
while claiming to be a reluctant witness, Willey had attempted to sell her ever-changing story and had contacted New York
literary agents at least two months prior to her story becoming public in August 1997.
*Ken Starr knew that Willey had
attempted to market her ever-changing story to Michael Viner of Millennium Media for a book deal before testifying in the
Paula Jones case. He also knew that she was attempting to sell her story to Richard Gooding at The Star. Her asking price was
"well over \\$300,000."
*Ken Starr knew that Willey had been secretly conferring with the Jones lawyers even as she
assured the Clinton lawyers that she was a "friend of the administration." During this same period, on November 10, 1997, she
wrote yet another letter to the White House, asking to be invited to their Christmas party.
*Ken Starr knew that
Willey's allegations were inconsistent, that her story changed every time she told it and that she had failed a lie detector
test administered by the OIC.
*Ken Starr knew that Willey's allegations of a threatening jogger came long after it
allegedly occurred, just as she was asked to explain the vast discrepancies in her sworn testimony. Her testimony had evolved
from no White House problem on the day in question in Civil Court records, to sixty-three times that she did "not remember"
or did "not recall" in the Jones deposition, to, less than six weeks later "recalling" her alleged experience in great detail
for Sixty Minutes and the nation.
*Ken Starr knew it would be difficult for any rational person to believe that Willey,
predawn, in pouring rain, post surgery and with a neck brace, unable to sleep, took three dogs on leashes to walk on the
road. To take it one step further and believe that an anonymous jogger was waiting in the predawn, pouring rain, hoping that
having recently had surgery she would be unable to sleep and decide to walk her dogs his way so that he could threaten her is
astounding.
*Ken Starr knew, as five witnesses who the OIC interviewed also knew, that Willey had, in fact, been seeking
a relationship with the President and was enthralled with him. Linda Tripp even told him Willey said nothing about a grope,
and was happy about whatever had happened...
*Ken Starr knew that Willey had called one person the night the incident
had actually occurred and told that person she had met privately with the President and was thrilled.
*Ken Starr wanted
me silenced so much that Willey was give a second, sweeping and unprecedented immunity agreement after she lied directly to
the OIC and violated her original immunity agreement. Kenneth Starr was willing, at all costs, including sending me to prison
for forty years, to protect and maintain the fiction that Willey was a credible witness.
*Ken Starr knew that my sister
received a threatening call on November 1, 1998. A male caller told her that she needed to tell her sister "if she knows what
is good for her and her son, she will back Willey's story." This call and two later incidents were immediately reported to
the Justice Dept., FBI, and local authorities. We went, in the case of the phone call, from assurances of immediate answers
to no answer at all. My sister finally involved a family friend, Congressman Bill McCollum. Mr. McCollum spoke at length with
the Director of the FBI and was told that it would be investigated. We have recently learned, from the DOJ, that the OIC took
the case and that a "highly placed individual" there ordered that no investigation be conducted. Despite the fact that David
Barger specifically asked a female witness in the Grand Jury if she made the call, Barger and Starr both denied any knowledge
of the call. Mr. McCollum has only recently learned that there was no investigation, he pledged his support to my sister and
has assigned staff for follow-up. He has assured our family that we will get answers as to why there was never any
investigation and who gave that order.
My crime was standing up to Ken Starr. My crime was speaking out
against him and his Gestapo tactics. My crime was telling the truth, the real truth, and not the "Ken Starr amended and
revised" version of truth provided to me during the last-chance "secret" meeting I had with him on November 9, 1998. I left
that meeting in tears because we learned that my failure to endorse their version of truth would result in my indictment.
I
was given several choices that day. I could say that the grope was consensual or that it was nonconsensual; or I could choose
my own day, week, month, and year to claim that I had been told about the grope. I could confirm the grope or be indicted. I
could not confirm the grope. I had no such information, I only had the truth. I went home and waited to be indicted.
You
have now heard at least part of what my defense would have been had we presented one. I trusted my lawyer when she said Starr
had not proven his case. I also realized that there were witnesses who feared Willey. Other witnesses had families who would
clearly be hurt by testimony. Absent the need to do otherwise, the right answer for me was to stop. It was time to draw the
line.
The fact remains that a 53-year- old single parent and grandmother from Virginia should not have had to face this
kind of horror, not in this country. Not in America.
In the final analysis, We do not harbor any ill will towards
desperate liars like Kathleen Willey and Juanita Broaderick. It is Ken Starr and his prosecutors who deserve absolute
contempt. Willey and Broaderick evidently did what they had to do to protect themselves from selective prosecution in
connection with any financial or tax improprieties. Given the scrutiny that Julie Hiatt Steele was forced to endure, it is
safe to assume that liars like Kathleen Willey and Juanita Broaderick were given two choices -lie about President Clinton or
face the scorn of ignorant Prosecutors who exploit vulnerable people. We are living the age of survivor, and Willey and
Broaderick did what they had to do to survive. At the same time, the world would be a far better place if they manifested the
courage and the stamina of people who are sincere and credible. The world would be a far better place if people like Kathleen
Willey, Ken Starr and Juanita Broaderick did not endorse perjury with absolute impunity and immunity. When people like Ken
Starr grant people like Kathleen Willey immunity from prosecution, they create an absolute mockery of justice.
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