Questions Raised on Story of Weekend With Actress : Deli Manager Places Hart at Store

The manager of a suburban Washington delicatessen said Wednesday that he remembers seeing Gary Hart, two young women and another man come into his shop early last Saturday afternoon to buy sandwiches--raising questions about a newspaper account of the Democratic presidential candidate’s weekend encounter with actress-model Donna Rice.

The store manager’s statement, if correct, tends to challenge a key assertion by the Miami Herald that reporters staking out Hart’s Washington town house saw the two enter the residence late Friday night and emerge for the first time Saturday evening. It also appears to support Hart’s contention that the newspaper’s stakeout of his town house was flawed and “spotty.”

Drops From Sight

However, after consenting to a telephone interview, Steven White of Alexandria, the store manager, dropped from sight and was unavailable to answer further questions. Moreover, Herald reporter Jim McGee said Wednesday that the store manager’s account conflicts with statements by William Broadhurst, a Hart adviser who spent much of last weekend with the former Colorado senator, Rice and a woman friend of Rice.

According to McGee, Broadhurst on Sunday disputed the Herald reporters’ contention that Hart stayed with Rice inside the town house all day Saturday and said that the four spent Saturday on a Virginia outing that included a stop for sandwiches. Yet, as Broadhurst told it, McGee said Wednesday, the two men stayed in Broadhurst’s car outside the delicatessen while the women went in to buy sandwiches--to avoid being “mobbed” in the store by people who recognized Hart.

These puzzling and still-inconclusive developments Wednesday underscored the contradictions and ambiguities that continue to cloud the question of Hart’s involvement with the 29-year-old Rice.

Confusion Remains

Even after three days of intensive news media inquiries and a public controversy that threatens to derail Hart’s quest for the 1988 Democratic presidential nomination, substantial inconsistencies and points of confusion still exist in the statements from the Miami Herald, Hart campaign officials and Hart himself about the weekend’s events and others.

In particular, the controversy over Hart’s association with the young Miami woman has produced conflicting descriptions of Hart’s activities Friday night and Saturday, the period that the Miami Herald said Hart spent mostly alone with the young woman.

Central to the Herald’s contention that Hart and Rice spent more than 20 hours together in Hart’s Washington town house is the newspaper’s claim that between two and five of its staff members watched both entrances of the house from 5 a.m. last Saturday until about 8:30 p.m. that day, when Hart and Rice emerged together.

The newspaper said nobody entered or left the Hart house during that period.

Excursion Asserted

Hart and Rice strongly denied the Miami Herald report and said that she stayed Friday night at the house of Broadhurst, a Washington lawyer and adviser to Hart. In addition, Rice and Broadhurst have told reporters that they, Hart, and Lynn Armandt, a Miami friend of Rice, spent most of Saturday afternoon on an excursion in suburban Alexandria, Va., across the Potomac River from Washington.

Hart has acknowledged that he made an error of judgment in socializing with Rice, “by putting myself in circumstances that could be misconstrued.” But he said: Did I do anything immoral? I absolutely did not.”

In a telephone conversation Wednesday, White, the delicatessen manager, said he recognized Hart in the store early Saturday afternoon. White said the former senator was accompanied by two young women and a man who bought sandwiches. “Hart was in here on Saturday, I’m pretty sure,” White said, adding that it was “around lunchtime.”

He was not more specific about the time, saying it could have been anytime between noon and 2 p.m.

Departure Described

Hart’s deputy campaign director, John Emerson, said Wednesday that Hart and the others left his house about 1:30 p.m. Emerson provided the name of the Alexandria delicatessen but did not name White.

On Monday, in an interview with reporters from Miami and the Denver Post, Rice said that she, Hart and their two companions spent most of Saturday afternoon in Alexandria and bought sandwiches at a shop on the city’s waterfront. White said he had not thought the visit noteworthy at the time and had had no contact with officials from Hart’s campaign since the controversy arose.

A chronology of the episode, based on press reports and interviews with Miami Herald reporters: --Friday at 5:30 p.m.: Miami Herald reporter Jim McGee boarded Eastern Airlines Flight 996, acting on a tip from an anonymous woman caller who had told the newspaper that an attractive blond woman in her late 20s would be traveling to Washington to spend the weekend with Hart. McGee saw two passengers who fit this description.

--Friday at 9 p.m.: Upon arriving at Washington National Airport, McGee went directly to Hart’s neighborhood on Capitol Hill to watch the front door of his town house from across the street. He was not able to watch the unlit back entrance, which opens onto an alley behind the house.

--Friday at 9:15 p.m.: Editor Douglas Clifton joined McGee and watched the rear entrance.

--Friday at 9:30 p.m.: McGee saw Hart and one of the women from the airline flight leave through the front door, get into Hart’s car parked on the street and drive away. The woman was identified later as Donna Rice.

Broadhurst, interviewed by the Herald on Saturday night and Sunday morning, before gaps in the paper’s surveillance became known, said Rice and Hart were not alone when they left the house at 9:30. Broadhurst said reporters failed to see him and Armandt leave simultaneously from the back door.

--Friday at 10:45 p.m.: Clifton left the Hart house for National Airport to rent a car.

--Friday at 11:17 p.m: McGee, again alone, observed Hart and Rice returning to the Hart town house. Hart parked his car about 150 feet down the street and the two walked to the front door.

Broadhurst confirmed this observation but said the reporter again failed to see him and Armandt enter through the back door and leave 10 or 15 minutes later with Rice to return to his house--with Hart remaining alone in the town house.

In an interview Wednesday, Clifton said that he was gone from his post about 45 minutes, returning about 11:30. Asked if this timing did not leave open the possibility that Rice, Armandt and Broadhurst did leave from the unwatched back door a few minutes after he left, he said: “I guess it does.”

--Saturday at 3 a.m.: The two reporters left the Hart house for two hours to “take a break.”

--Saturday at 5 a.m.: Surveillance of the Hart house resumed, the two reporters “orbiting” the house--driving around the block--to watch both entrances. No one is seen entering or leaving during the next 15 hours.

--Saturday at 11 a.m.: Herald staff members James Savage and Tom Fiedler and photographer Brian Smith join McGee and Clifton in watching the house. Clifton said at least four people watched the house continuously until Saturday evening.

Failure to See Asserted

Broadhurst said the reporters failed to see Rice walk back to Hart’s house Saturday morning to deliver some campaign documents. He also contended that he, Armandt, Rice and Hart all met at Hart’s house at midday Saturday and left for a their drive to Alexandria. Broadhurst told the Herald that they dropped Hart off at his own house “about dusk” and continued on to Broadhurst’s nearby town house.

The Herald said its reporters observed none of these movements.

--Saturday at 8:40 p.m.: Shortly after dark, the reporters saw Hart and Rice for the first time since Friday evening, leaving by the rear entrance. The two walked through the alley behind Hart’s house and circled the block toward Hart’s car, arm in arm, the Herald said, then turned abruptly and re-entered the Hart home through the front door, apparently after spotting the reporters.

About 30 minutes later, Hart emerged from the front entrance alone, moved his car several blocks down the street, then “walks up and down neighboring streets,” the Herald said. Savage and McGee approached Hart, identified themselves and began a 20-minute interview, during which Hart described Rice as a “friend of a friend.” Hart explained her presence by saying that she had stopped by to “pick up some things she had left” earlier.

In conversations Saturday and Sunday with the Herald, Hart campaign director William Dixon and Broadhurst confirmed this version and explained that the four were out most of the day in Virginia. However, in her press conference Monday, Rice said she, Broadhurst and Armandt had returned to Hart’s house Saturday evening, bringing him a barbecued chicken dinner, unobserved by the reporters. None of the other participants mentioned this reason for her presence.

The newspaper ended its surveillance of Hart’s house about 10 p.m. Saturday.