Thompson Criticizes Stalled Immunity Bid

Sen. Fred Thompson (R-Tenn.), who is heading the Senate’s campaign fund-raising inquiry, angrily criticized the Justice Department on Tuesday for failing to endorse grants of legal immunity to five potential witnesses--including four Buddhist nuns who are not likely to be subjects of prosecution.

“I do not have any confidence anymore in the Justice Department’s ability to carry out a credible investigation,” Thompson said, referring to the department’s criminal probe of fund-raising abuses.

Thompson’s Governmental Affairs Committee can grant immunity in exchange for testimony without the Justice Department’s consent, but such a move requires support from two-thirds of the panel’s members. Some Democrats have been reluctant to act without cover from the Justice Department.

A grant of immunity prohibits prosecutors from using anything a witness tells the Senate in a criminal trial.

The committee will take up the matter again today, and committee sources predicted that there will be enough support to grant immunity to all five witnesses.

After aides to Atty. Gen. Janet Reno balked at immunity in a closed-door meeting with committee members Tuesday, a frustrated Thompson--with several GOP colleagues at his side--suggested that the decision to oppose immunity is influenced by the Clinton administration’s involvement in the fund-raising controversy.

Agreeing with Thompson, Sen. Arlen Specter (R-Pa.) said he is so disgusted that he is looking into whether to take the department to court in an attempt to force the naming of an independent counsel. “In refusing to agree to these grants of immunity, it is a palpable abuse of discretion,” Specter said.

Justice Department spokesman Bert Brandenburg defended the agency’s review of the immunity question, saying it was only “doing its job, applying the same standards to each [immunity] request it has applied through the decades: whether a grant of immunity will harm prosecution.”

The standoff traces its origins to an earlier dispute, when congressional investigators undermined the criminal prosecutions of White House aides Oliver L. North and John M. Poindexter for their roles in the Iran-Contra affair by granting them immunity at congressional hearings. A court overturned the convictions of North and Poindexter, saying the cases were tainted by statements the men made at the hearings.

Ever since, congressional investigators and Justice Department prosecutors have struggled with their competing interests: publicizing wrongdoing versus prosecuting people for it.

In the present case, Senate Republicans hope to hear testimony from four Buddhist nuns with knowledge of fund-raising abuses at the Hsi Lai Temple in Hacienda Heights, Calif.: temple administrator Man Ho, temple treasurer Yi Chu, abbess Suh Jen Wu and another nun, Man Ya Shih, who is associated with a temple in Richardson, Texas.

Investigators want to hear about the donations many monks and nuns made to the Democratic National Committee during the 1996 presidential campaign--contributions that were later reimbursed by the temple. Former DNC fund-raiser John Huang, who is at the center of the controversy, set up a fund-raising luncheon at the temple that drew Vice President Gore. It has proved to be an embarrassment for the Democrats.

The fifth witness who may be offered immunity is Keshi Zahn, who in 1996 gave the Democrats more than $20,000, which records show was most of her annual salary. Zahn, a friend of controversial fund-raiser Yah Lin “Charlie” Trie, donated money passed to her from others, investigators say.

Senate Republicans are eager to grant immunity to all five straw donors to hear firsthand about fund-raising misdeeds during the last campaign. But committee Democrats say they want to be sure that giving the witnesses immunity does not interfere with the Justice Department’s wide-ranging criminal probe.

Brandenberg said the department has not taken a hard-line stance against all grants of immunity and that it has not expressed objection to immunity for 11 of 26 different witnesses for whom the committee has asked the department’s position, he said.

So far, the committee has voted to grant immunity to two Buddhist nuns, Hueitsan Huang and Siuw Moi Lian, and two other women, Yue F. Chu and Xi Ping Wang, associated with Trie. Neither of those were opposed by the Justice Department.

The department, however, has lodged major objections to immunity for Huang.

Huang’s attorney, Ty Cobb, has requested that Huang be immunized from prosecution for some crimes, but not others. Thompson has expressed doubt about whether that is possible.

Times staff writers Mark Gladstone and Ronald J. Ostrow contributed to this story.

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Today’s Hearing

Democrats today will begin three days of hearings focused on reports that a Republican off-shoot, the National Policy Forum, pursued money from overseas. The committee will examine how Hong Kong businessman Ambrous Tung Young provided $2.2 million in collateral for a loan to the forum as part of an elaborate plan by Republican National Chairman Haley Barbour, who founded the forum.

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THE LINEUP

Michael Baroody: former president of the National Policy forum

Benton L. Becker: an attorney retained by one of Young’s companies.

Researched by D’JAMILA SALEM FITZGERALD / Los Angeles Times