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Raw Blame History

aliases

Park On Meter

Hubbell was the former secretary and corporate lawyer of Park On Meter Inc., a small manufacturer of parking meters in Russellville, Arkansas, and the brother-in-law of the company's owner. Former Air Force intelligence officer Terry Reed claimed that Park On Meter was secretly manufacturing parts for M-16 rifles as a subcontractor on a CIA weapons project to supply the Contras. Hubbell admitted to a Time magazine reporter that POM was also making rocket launchers.²

The Casolaro Inquiry

In early 1994 Hubbell, as associate attorney general, ordered "a nationwide investigation" into the suspicious death of investigative reporter Danny Casolaro, who had been investigating connections between the Cabazon Indian Reservation, Wackenhut International, and weapons manufacturing for the Contras.²

He resigned that March.²

Resignation

"Shortly after their former partner Webster L. Hubbell became Associate Attorney General," the independent counsel reported, "Rose Law Firm members in Little Rock found irregularities in Hubbell's billings for 1989-92." He announced his resignation on March 14, 1994. The day before, a meeting at the White House attended by the president, the first lady, and the chief of staff had discussed his difficulties. "Afterwards, one or more individuals suggested that efforts should be made to help Hubbell find work," and the chief of staff, Mack McLarty, told Mrs. Clinton: "We're going to be supportive of Webb."¹

The Consulting Contracts

McLarty and his staff director, William Burton, "telephoned Hubbell about once a week, telling him he still had friends in the White House." McLarty, Erskine Bowles of the Small Business Administration, Truman Arnold, and Vernon Jordan "made calls on Hubbell's behalf." "As a result, seventeen people and companies who were supporters of the President hired Hubbell to do consulting work, paying him in excess of $500,000 over a period of less than a year." He reported 376,075 dollars of it on his tax return for 1994 and paid no tax on it.¹

One of the seventeen was the Lippo Group. On June 23, 1994, James Riady had breakfast with Hubbell at the Hay-Adams Hotel, met President Bill Clinton at ten with John Huang, and had lunch with Hubbell. On June 27 Hubbell wrote to a director of Hong Kong China Limited, a Lippo company, offering his services for 100,000 dollars a year, and the money was in his account by that day. The Independent Counsel's report quotes the letter to David T. Yeh, director of Hong Kong China Limited: "I am pleased to provide my consultant services to your company," and "the full range of my services for a fee of $100,000.00 per year payable in quarterly installments beginning on July 1, 1994." The same day Hong Kong China Limited wired 99,985 dollars into Hubbell's account at NationsBank in Washington. Hubbell told the Independent Counsel that Riady had wanted a one-year agreement with a retainer of 100,000 dollars, payable quarterly, and Hubbell said he was surprised that Riady had sent the full amount so soon.³ The House committee described the payment as "a lump sum of $100,000 for unknown services performed between June 27, 1994 and December 6, 1994."⁴ After his December 1994 plea Hubbell asked Riady to contribute 25,000 dollars toward his daughter's year at Davidson College, and Riady gave 12,500 dollars through C. Joseph Giroir; Hubbell later asked Giroir about the remaining 12,500 dollars and was told that Riady would give no more. The Independent Counsel recorded that none of the Lippo-related documents Hubbell produced showed substantive work for Lippo, and that Hubbell recalled telephoning Nancy Hernreich at the White House on more than one occasion to help members of the Riady family gain admission.⁵ "Both Riady and Hubbell refuse to describe what services, if any, Hubbell performed," a House committee reported. Lippo also paid for a trip to Jakarta and Bali for Hubbell and his wife. Before the committee Hubbell invoked the Fifth Amendment to the United States Constitution. He wrote in his memoir: "it wasn't hush money."⁶ In September 1994, after meetings in a Hong Kong office building bearing the Lippo name, Hubbell traveled to Jakarta, where he met the family's patriarch, Mochtar Riady, and the U.S. ambassador to Indonesia; James Riady introduced him there as a close friend of the president and told him to get Clinton to play golf in Bali during the Asia-Pacific Economic Cooperation meeting.¹

Plea

On December 6, 1994, he pleaded guilty in the federal court at Little Rock to one count of mail fraud and one of tax evasion, "admitting that he defrauded his former partners and clients out of at least $394,000." His lawyer later agreed that he had obtained 482,410 dollars and 83 cents. On June 28, 1995, Judge George Howard sentenced him to twenty-one months.¹

Independent Counsel findings

After the House committee's count of more than 700,000 dollars from friends and associates of the President, the Independent Counsel's report gave a narrower figure of approximately 450,010 dollars in consulting fees from fifteen of the seventeen clients between April 8 and the end of 1994, and found that Hubbell had reported 376,075 dollars on his 1994 federal return and paid no 1994 tax on the consulting income.³ The Independent Counsel "began investigating whether the consulting fees had been paid to influence Hubbell's cooperation" and "determined there was insufficient evidence to prove any such quid pro quo relating to Hubbell's post-resignation employment."³ The report also found that Hubbell failed to pay a substantial portion of his tax liabilities for 1994 and 1995, and that he pleaded guilty in June 1999 to one felony count of concealing material facts about the income.³

Footnotes

Office of the Independent Counsel, Final Report of the Independent Counsel In Re: Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan Association, vol. 3, part C, "Webster L. Hubbell's Billing Practices and Tax Filings." https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-ICREPORT-MADISON/pdf/GPO-ICREPORT-MADISON-3-2.pdf ↩︎
Webb, Gary. Dark Alliance: The CIA, the Contras, and the Crack Cocaine Explosion. Seven Stories Press, 1998, chapter 6. ↩︎
Independent Counsel, Final Report of the Independent Counsel In Re: Madison Guaranty Savings & Loan Association, vol. 3, part C, "Webster L. Hubbell's Billing Practices and Tax Filings," including the passages on consulting income, the June 27, 1994 letter, and footnote 4 on the June 1999 plea. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-ICREPORT-MADISON/pdf/GPO-ICREPORT-MADISON-3-2.pdf ↩︎
House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight, Investigation of Political Fundraising Improprieties and Possible Violations of Law, H. Rept. 105-829, vol. 2, 1998, Part A, section III, "Webster Hubbell," footnotes 91 through 104. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CRPT-105hrpt829/html/CRPT-105hrpt829-vol2.htm ↩︎
Independent Counsel, Final Report of the Independent Counsel In Re: Madison Guaranty Savings & Loan Association, vol. 3, part C, pp. 33 to 35, footnotes 177 through 192, citing the interview of Webster Hubbell (June 25, 1999). https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/GPO-ICREPORT-MADISON/pdf/GPO-ICREPORT-MADISON-3-2.pdf ↩︎
House Committee on Government Reform and Oversight, Investigation of Political Fundraising Improprieties and Possible Violations of Law, H. Rept. 105-829, 1998, vol. 2. https://www.govinfo.gov/content/pkg/CRPT-105hrpt829/html/CRPT-105hrpt829-vol2.htm ; Hubbell, Webster. Friends in High Places. William Morrow, 1997. ↩︎

8.4 KiB Raw Blame History