Espy-Clinton

Espay- Clinton White House counsel assails special Body of woman fighter pilot prosecutor over comments on witness recovered after crash By William Neikirk Chicago Tribune Michael Kilian Chicago Tribune WASHINGTON In a strongly worded letter, White Couns WASHINGTON The U.S. Navy Wednesday recovered the Abner Mikva told a special out of line in wreckage of the F-14 Tomcat flown by Lt. Kara Hultgreen, the appearing to support a witness' allegations about payments to United States' first woman carrier fighter pilot who was killed Bill Clinton when he was Arkansas governor. at sea Oct. 25 in a landing accident 50 miles off San Diego. Mikva described himself as being ``extremely dismayed" The accident occurred as Hultgreen, 29, was making a final that independent counsel Donald Smaltz should go public with approach to the deck of the USS Abraham Lincoln after a unsupported charges made by a former pilot for Tyson Foods routine flight from Miramar Naval Air Station, her home base. Inc. Both she and her radar intercept officer, Lt. Matthew Time magazine this week quoted Smaltz as saying that the Klemish, ejected, but only he survived. Because the plane story about alleged payments told by Joseph Henrickson, a rolled onto its back as it went out of control, Hultgreen was former Tyson Foods pilot, "has a ring of truth to it." ejected directly into the sea and was killed instantly. In addition to dressing down the prosecutor, Mikva, a Her body was recovered Nov. 12 in 3,700 feet of water former federal appeals judge, told Smaltz he was violating not far from the sunken jet. She was buried with full federal policy. He cited the code of federal regulations honors at Arlington National Cemetery. barring Justice Department prosecutors from commenting on This was the Navy's third attempt to retrieve the the credibility of witnesses and their statements. aircraft, a Navy spokeswoman said. Recovery was made using Time reported that Smaltz was looking into allegations undersea robotic equipment that attached cables to the by Joseph Henrickson, 43, a former pilot at Tyson, who 62-foot-long fighter. said that he carried sealed white envelopes from Tyson's The F-14 was taken to North Island Nayal Air Station at headquarters in northwest Arkansas to Little Rock on six San Diego, where it will be examined by a team of experts occasions in the 1980s. from the Naval Safety Center in Norfolk, Va. According to According to Time, Henrickson said he held up the reports from witnesses and a videotape of the landing envelopes to the light and said each appeared to be attempt, the aircraft may have had engine failure when it stuffed with $100 bills, which he believed were intended was at dangerously low speed and altitude some 200 yards for Clinton. There is no evidence that Clinton received astern of the carrier. The jet yawed to the left, went any such envelopes. nose up and winged over to the left before plunging into When the Time story appeared, White House officials the sea. A puff of smoke also was sighted. were angry over what they regarded as flimsy allegations A Navy spokeswoman said the accident investigation and said that Smaltz had given them credibility. One could take several weeks. The results will be turned over official expressed doubt that anyone could determine the to the Navy high command, which will determine whether denomination of money in an envelope, or that the contents they will be made public. Hultgreen's mother, San Antonio were indeed money. lawyer Sally Spears, would be informed immediately, Clinton's private attorney, James Kendall, protested in however, the spokeswoman said. a letter to Smaltz for making the story public. But the After the accident, a still anonymous caller provoked a comments by the White House counsel add the greater weight media controversy by charging that the Navy had lowered of that office to the protests. standards to allow Hultgreen to qualify for carrier duty "I was extremely dismayed to read these quotations in a move to appeal to "political correctness." from you regarding both the nature and credibility of Mr. The charges evaporated after Hultgreen's fellow Henrickson's allegations," Mikva wrote the special aviators and commanding officer defended her as an prosecutor in his letter, a copy of which was obtained by excellent pilot, and her mother released official flight the Tribune. records showing that Hultgreen had qualified third-highest He said that if the news stories about Smaltz's in a group of seven with an above-average score 30 points comments were inaccurate, ``I would be interested in so over the minimum requirement. learning. Otherwise, I am disturbed that a special Hultgreen, an aerospace engineering graduate of the prosecutor would, during the investigatory stages of a University of Texas, spent her early childhood in criminal matter, make observations to the press indicating Lincolnshire, III. the prosecutor's views of the nature and strength of allegations by potential witnesses." Smaltz, 57, a former Los Angeles attorney, was appointed to investigate allegations that Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy received favors from Tyson Foods and other companies. But now the probe has broadened to include Tyson's relationship with Clinton when he was governor, Time reported. Tyson, the world's largest poultry producer, had close ties to the Clintons, and some of its executives helped finance his campaigns. In addition, James Blair, one of the company's attorneys, gave Hillary Rodham Clinton investment advice that enabled her to make huge profits in commodities trading. Regarding Smaltz's comments, Mikva said "this type of conduct goes directly agianst what I understand to be the proper behavior of a special prosecutor; I had thought that federal prosecutors present their evidence to grand juries and try their cases in court and not through comments to the press about the credibility of particular evidence or allegations."