Witness Tells of McDougal, Clinton Meeting

Whitewater witness David Hale testified for the first time Wednesday that he was informed of a planned meeting at the governor’s mansion in which Bill Clinton and James B. McDougal were supposed to discuss a loan.

Under renewed questioning by prosecutors during his eighth day on the witness stand, Hale said he was told by McDougal, Clinton’s Whitewater business partner, around Jan. 10, 1986, that the meeting was to occur on a Saturday at the governor’s mansion. Clinton was governor at the time.

Records from the governor’s office show that a meeting was on Clinton’s schedule so that he could sign unspecified personal business papers. The White House had no immediate comment on whether the meeting took place.

McDougal “said he was going by the governor’s mansion to discuss our loan,” Hale testified. “He said, ‘I am going by to talk about it with Clinton on Saturday.’ ”

Hale didn’t specify what “our loan” was.

Hale last week testified that there was another meeting in early 1986 where he, Clinton and McDougal gathered to discuss what turned out to be a $300,000 loan to a company operated by McDougal’s wife, Susan.

The $300,000 loan was never repaid and is now part of the trial, in which the McDougals and Gov. Jim Guy Tucker are accused of conspiring to defraud the McDougals’ savings and loan and Hale’s federally backed lending company.

Outside court, McDougal said he hadn’t gone to the governor’s mansion.