NEW YORK - A giant shadow across the United States Senate campaign of Hillary Rodham Clinton lifted yesterday when Independent Counsel Robert Ray wound up the six-year Whitewater investigation.
Ray declared he had insufficient evidence to recommend criminal charges against President Bill Clinton or the first lady.
By sending his sealed report to a panel of appellate judges, Ray formally shut down an inquiry that began in 1994 and has haunted the first family ever since.
The probe into a web of allegations of financial fraud and obstruction of justice led to 14 convictions and cost $US50 million ($121 million).
The Independent Counsel, who succeeded Kenneth Starr, issued a statement summarising his findings. "The office determined that evidence was insufficient to prove to a jury beyond a reasonable doubt that either the President or Mrs Clinton knowingly participated in any criminal conduct," it said.
Aides to Hillary Clinton had been quietly braced for Ray's ruling. Had he recommended pursuing charges against her, the impact on her race in New York could have been devastating. She remains in a very tight race with Republican congressman Rick Lazio.
The shelving of the inquiry will also give great relief to President Clinton. But his legal troubles are not over. Ray has said he intends ruling after Clinton leaves office in January on whether he should face obstruction-of-justice charges in the Monica Lewinsky case.
The investigation initially focused on the failure in the mid-1980s of an Arkansas Savings and Loan bank, the Madison Guaranty, which was owned by Jim McDougal, a close friend of Bill Clinton, then Governor of Arkansas. McDougal and wife Susan were at the same time partners with the Clintons in a property development in northern Arkansas that went sour.
But over the years the inquiry broadened considerably, eventually even absorbing the Lewinsky debacle.
It also looked into Hillary Clinton's activities while at the Rose Law Firm in Little Rock, both in the Whitewater deal and another development involving McDougal called Castle Grande.
The Clintons' critics are certain to seize on the language of the statement, which fell far short of complete absolution. It was, nonetheless, cheered by the White House.
"Robert Ray is now the latest investigator to complete an examination of the transactions related to Whitewater Development Co and conclude that there are no grounds for legal action," said press secretary Joe Lockhart.
The statement was hailed also by Susan McDougal, whose husband died in jail. "It was a real estate deal that went wrong and there never was anything criminal about it," she said.
Among the 14 who were convicted in the course of the investigation was Webster Hubbell, a close friend of the Clintons, and the former Governor of Arkansas, Guy Tucker.
- INDEPENDENT
AdvertisementAdvertise with NZME.