More Portions of Willey Deposition Disclosed

Attorneys for President Clinton on Friday released new portions of Kathleen E. Willey’s deposition in which she said she continued to carry on a close social relationship with Clinton after he allegedly had groped her.

The excerpts, from the cross-examination of Willey during her deposition in the Paula Corbin Jones sexual-harassment lawsuit against the president, also included Willey’s denial that Clinton ever offered her a job in return for sex or that she was blocked from a White House job because she rebuffed his advances.

The 10 pages from her deposition were included in about 200 pages of the Clinton lawyers’ final request for a federal judge in Little Rock, Ark., to dismiss the Jones lawsuit.

Jones is alleging that Clinton, while governor of Arkansas, exposed himself and asked her to “kiss” his penis. Her story is similar to Willey’s account that Clinton groped her near the Oval Office when she worked as a volunteer, her lawyers say.

The filing by the Clinton legal team opens a critical phase in the Jones case.

U.S. District Judge Susan Webber Wright is expected to decide within the next two weeks whether the unprecedented case against a sitting president should go to trial or whether the lawsuit is simply an attempt to embarrass his presidency.

Robert S. Bennett, the president’s lead attorney, argued Friday that there is no evidence to support Jones’ claims that she was sexually harassed in her job as an Arkansas state employee.

Bennett also lashed out at Jones’ lawyers, particularly for their attempt last week to use depositions from Willey and other women to show that Clinton has preyed on women repeatedly.

He called those allegations “salacious,” saying that the depositions were a “a piece of garbage . . . politically motivated distortions . . . and without legal merit.”

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But John Whitehead, president of the Rutherford Institute, which is paying for Jones’ legal costs, fired back that the “case must proceed to trial” because Clinton is getting away with a callous attitude toward women.

“In defendant Clinton’s eyes,” Whitehead said, “women are purely to be degraded, purely to be chased, dominated and conquered.”

Bennett conceded that he had considered including in his filing papers information about Jones’ past sex life but decided against doing so.

He said that he was going to use that material to rebut her claim that she has suffered from “sexual aversion” since the alleged encounter with Clinton in May 1991. He noted that her lawsuit has not shown any proof of such an affliction.

“There are no medical bills, no interference with her marriage, not even an aspirin,” Bennett said. “I would say it is a big joke.”

He declined to say whether Clinton asked him not to bring up Jones’ sexual past. But White House Press Secretary Mike McCurry, when asked Friday if Clinton thought it was inappropriate to dredge up her sexual history, said simply, “Yes.”

Donovan Campbell Jr., the lead attorney for Jones, said that bringing her sexual history into the case would be a cheap shot.

“He [Bennett] and his client [Clinton] do not truly uphold the standards and goals of the Violence Against Women Act of 1994, signed into law by defendant Clinton, to fully protect female victims of sexual misconduct by men,” Campbell said.

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In the excerpts from her deposition, Willey said she considered Clinton a friend and that they often hugged each other, but that he never forced himself on her and that she was free to leave during the encounter she says occurred near the Oval Office in November 1993.

Willey also admitted that she was emotionally upset and crying about her personal financial situation when she met with Clinton that day--a situation that Bennett, who was questioning her, appeared to be suggesting could have clouded her recollection of what had happened.

Her husband’s body was discovered the day after the meeting. He was the victim of a self-inflicted gunshot wound. Afterward, Willey said, she was invited back to the White House by Clinton secretary Nancy Hernreich and ultimately received several political appointments.

“The president wanted to see me when I came back to the White House after my husband’s suicide,” she said. “I don’t remember how I know that because I was in a horrible state after he died for quite a long time.

“I think--I do know that Nancy had called. I think maybe she had said: ‘Please let us know when you come back because we would like to see you.’ I think.”

Other deposition excerpts included those from two other women who have alleged having sexual affairs with Clinton. In each case, Bennett used the excerpts to show a different side to the accusations or to question the motives of the accusers.

In questioning Dolly Kyle Browning, a high school friend of Clinton’s, Bennett sought to show that she does not fit into a pattern of allegations that Clinton forced himself onto her or that any employment situation was involved.

Browning told Bennett in her deposition that Clinton “absolutely” did not force her to have sex and that she considered their relationship to have grown out of “friendship.”

Gennifer Flowers, who has said that she had a 12-year affair with Clinton, described receiving hundreds of thousands of dollars for posing nude in a men’s magazine and also telling her story to various television and print tabloids. After initial denials, Clinton has changed his position on whether he had sex with her.

Bennett also filed material seeking to discredit Larry Patterson, an Arkansas state trooper who once was part of Clinton’s security detail. Patterson, expected to be a key witness for Jones, has claimed he routinely recruited women to engage in extramarital relations with the then governor.

But Bennett released a sworn statement from Raymond “Buddy” Young, former chief of the security detail and Patterson’s boss, that questioned the trooper’s credibility. Young declared that Patterson “hustled [women] for himself on a regular day-in and day-out basis.

“Larry Patterson’s mentality and objective in life was to sleep with as many women as he could,” Young said.

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As to Patterson’s accounts of Clinton’s womanizing, “a lot of it is Larry Patterson’s imagination and he’s got a big one,” Young said in his deposition.

“If Bill Clinton had a meeting with a woman behind closed doors, Larry assumed it was for the purpose of sex, because that’s what it would have been had he been there,” Young added.

Patterson, in his deposition testimony, said that he has spoken at conservative political conferences and on radio talk shows around the country for $500 to $1,000 per occasion, plus expenses. He said he generally is asked to discuss his observations about womanizing by Clinton when he was governor.

Asked about a video entitled “The Clinton Chronicles” marketed by conservative evangelist Jerry Falwell, in which Clinton is accused of murders and involvement in illicit drugs, Patterson said that he had no evidence of that.

“At no time have I ever said that Bill Clinton’s ever been involved in any murder, or at no time have I ever said that Bill Clinton has ever used or abused drugs,” he testified.

Another trooper, L. D. Brown, who has testified that women sometimes were arranged for Clinton, was asked by Bennett if he had sex with them.

“Well, I’m not going to answer that,” Brown replied.