Tripp Lawsuit Reassigned From Reagan Appointee to Clinton Judge

Three federal judges appointed by President Clinton took a lawsuit filed by Linda Tripp away from a Reagan appointee and randomly assigned the case by computer to one of themselves, court records show.

Judges Emmet Sullivan, Paul Friedman and Gladys Kessler run the calendar committee that controls the docket at the U.S. District Courthouse. In an Aug. 11 order, they said the year-old Tripp suit never should have been given to Judge Royce Lamberth.

Sullivan is now overseeing the lawsuit. Odds favored the case going to a Clinton appointee, despite the random selection, because nine of the 13 judges in the courthouse were appointed by Clinton.

Tripp, a Pentagon employee, is suing Pentagon spokesman Kenneth H. Bacon and the administration over the release of information from her personnel records at the height of the Monica S. Lewinsky scandal. Tripp’s surreptitious tape recordings of Lewinsky confiding a sexual relationship with Clinton triggered the impeachment crisis.

The decision to remove the case from Lamberth’s control comes amid a judicial investigation into why the chief federal judge in the District of Columbia, Norma Holloway Johnson, bypassed the computer system and directed half a dozen criminal prosecutions of campaign fund-raisers and friends of Clinton and Vice President Al Gore to Clinton-appointed judges.