Whitewater Witness Begins Prison Term
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FORT WORTH — Key Whitewater prosecution witness David Hale reported to a federal prison Friday to begin serving a 28-month sentence for defrauding the Small Business Administration.
Hale pleaded guilty March 22, 1994, to misrepresenting the amount of capital in his lending company in order to get more federal funding.
The former judge and banker was the main witness in the Whitewater-related trial that resulted in the convictions of Arkansas Gov. Jim Guy Tucker and James B. and Susan McDougal. The McDougals were President Clinton and First Lady Hillary Rodham Clinton’s business partners in the Whitewater Development Corp. in Arkansas.
Hale wasn’t sentenced until March of this year, shortly after the trial began.
Hale cooperated with Whitewater investigators and initially said then-Gov. Clinton pressured him to make a $300,000 loan to Susan McDougal in 1986, but didn’t repeat that claim during the Whitewater trial.
The president denied Hale’s allegations and testified for the defendants.
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