Criminal Probe Into White House E-Mails Is Opened

The Justice Department disclosed Thursday that it opened a criminal investigation this week into allegations that White House officials withheld e-mail messages that could have shed light on a range of controversies that have plagued the Clinton administration.

Coming just days after the White House put the so-called Filegate investigation behind it, the development could give Texas Gov. George W. Bush new ammunition in his effort to depict Vice President Al Gore as part of a scandal-ridden and unethical administration.

Justice Department officials said that their campaign finance task force--the same group that looked into allegations of campaign fund-raising abuses by the 1996 Clinton-Gore campaign--will look into the new controversy over mismanagement of White House e-mails and alleged threats by White House officials against disclosure of the problem.

Meanwhile, as a Republican-led congressional committee opened hearings on the matter, which the White House has characterized as an innocent glitch, White House counsel Beth Nolan described how the problem played out in the vice president’s office.

In written testimony submitted to the House Government Reform Committee, Nolan said that, because of widespread computer problems, Gore’s office had failed to furnish thousands of e-mail messages in response to subpoenas that might have shed light on 1996 fund-raising efforts.

While the vice president’s office did supply many e-mails to a Senate committee investigating campaign finance abuses in 1997, an undetermined number was omitted because they were not captured by the White House master automated records management system, Nolan said.

But, she added, White House lawyers “have found no evidence that anyone . . . attempted to withhold or hide responsive e-mail records from this committee or any other investigative body.”

Aides to the president and vice president, for example, “searched for and produced [to Congress] approximately 7,700 pages of e-mail records related to campaign finance matters,” she said.

The committee, chaired by Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), accepted Nolan’s prepared testimony but postponed questioning her until next week.

In live testimony, employees of defense contractor Northrop Grumman, which has managed the White House computer system, told the committee that White House officials threatened them with jail two years ago if they disclosed the e-mail problem.

The breakdown was discovered in June 1998 at the height of the Monica S. Lewinsky furor and ongoing inquiries and subpoenas issued by Congress and independent counsels in connection with other suspected misconduct by administration figures.

White House officials were told that incoming e-mail messages were not recorded starting in August 1996. The problem was not fixed until November 1998.

The affected e-mails were among documents covered by subpoenas but investigating agencies were not told of the breakdown.

Betty Lambuth, the Northrop Grumman manager whose team discovered the problem, told Burton’s panel that she and her colleagues “were threatened . . . with loss of our jobs, arrest and jail if we told anyone,” including their spouses, about the problem.

“I quickly came to the conclusion that the Clinton White House had no intention of fixing the problem,” Lambuth said. “My conclusion was based on the fact that nothing was done to fix the problem and the e-mails continued to be left out of any searches in response to subpoenas and other document requests.”

Lambuth said team member Robert Haas told her that the missing e-mails from persons and agencies outside the White House, such as the Democratic National Committee, dealt with several politically charged issues: Gore’s involvement in campaign fund-raising activities, the Lewinsky scandal, the transfer of FBI files to the White House and “the sale of Clinton Commerce Department trade mission seats in exchange for campaign contributions.”

Haas, however, in response to committee questions, said he had determined only that some missing e-mails were related to messages about the Lewinsky case. He said he did not know about the other areas of investigation.

But Haas confirmed Lambuth’s testimony about threats. He said that Laura Crabtree, a White House computer supervisor, told him “there would be a jail cell with my name on it” if he even told his wife about the e-mail problem.

Lambuth and Haas said that threats of jail also were voiced by Crabtree’s superior, Mark Lindsay, director of White House management and administration.

Called later before the panel, Crabtree and Lindsay both denied making threats, while confirming that they had told Northrop Grumman employees to keep the e-mail problem confidential.

“I never would have said anything about a jail cell,” Crabtree testified. Haas “either had a bad recollection or an overactive imagination,” she said.

Lindsay testified that “I never made any such threats . . . and I ordered that the problem be fixed.”

The e-mail problem became public knowledge earlier this month when Judicial Watch, a conservative legal foundation, filed a civil lawsuit.

Also filed in court was a deposition from Robert J. Conrad Jr., head of the Justice Department’s campaign finance task force, declaring that his staff was looking into allegations that subpoenaed White House e-mails were improperly withheld from Justice and other requesting agencies.

Justice Department officials said that they also were examining accusations that White House officials made threats to Northrop Grumman employees.

Bush, asked about the criminal inquiry during a campaign stop in Florida, responded, “This is a White House that needs to let the sun shine in when it comes to campaign funding allegations.”