Hubbell Again Facing Questions on Whitewater

Whitewater independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr is stepping up pressure on former Associate Atty. Gen. Webster Hubbell for more cooperation in the investigation of the first family’s role in an Arkansas real estate deal, Time magazine reported.

Attorneys close to the investigation believe that Starr is trying to compel Hubbell to come up with more information after his release this week from 17 months of federal confinement, Time says in its current issue.

The article said Starr is looking into whether some of the work Hubbell got between the time he left the Justice Department and pleaded guilty to felony charges was, in essence, hush money arranged by Clinton associates to keep him from providing damaging information against the Clintons.

Hubbell spent 15 months in a Maryland federal prison and nearly two months in a Washington halfway house after pleading guilty to mail fraud and tax evasion in December 1994.

The Time story disclosed that Starr last month subpoenaed Time Warner Inc., the magazine’s parent company, to provide details about its hiring of Hubbell for a short stint of legal consulting in 1994, weeks before his guilty plea to the two felony charges.

Whitewater investigators have already been digging into how Hubbell--after resigning under pressure as the No. 3 Justice Department official in March 1994--was able to get legal or lobbying jobs for the Los Angeles International Airport and for the Indonesian Lippo Group, later named in a flap about Democratic donors.