Note Raises Clemency Questions

An unsigned note found in the Clinton White House archives has revived questions about whether Sen. Hillary Rodham Clinton knew of her brother’s efforts to win presidential clemency for convicted Los Angeles cocaine dealer Carlos Vignali.

Rep. Dan Burton (R-Ind.), who has headed a six-month investigation into controversial clemencies granted by President Clinton, cited the note in asking Hugh Rodham last month if he had told “anyone on the White House staff that the Vignali matter was important to the first lady.”

The White House note, a copy of which was obtained Wednesday by The Times, was discovered by investigators for the House Government Reform Committee in a Vignali file kept by former senior Clinton aide Bruce Lindsey. The note, which was neither signed nor dated, quotes Rodham as saying that the Vignali matter “is very important to him and the First Lady as well as others.”

According to one committee official, investigators think the note was written in December or January. It was found in the National Archives files for the Clinton White House and bears the stamp “Clinton library photocopy.”

“We’re guessing it was written by a Lindsey secretary or an assistant,” said the official, who spoke on condition of anonymity. “We’d like to know for sure.”

Neither Lindsey nor Rodham’s lawyer, Nancy Luque, could be reached for comment Wednesday. In testimony before the Burton committee last spring, Lindsey acknowledged that Rodham had spoken to him several times about the Vignali case.

Rodham, a Florida lawyer, has acknowledged being paid more than $200,000 by Vignali’s father, Horacio Vignali, to press President Clinton’s aides for a commutation for his son. His lawyer said the money was returned. The younger Vignali was freed from prison in January after serving six years of a 15-year sentence for narcotics charges.

Sen. Clinton insisted in February, when her brother’s involvement became public, that she knew nothing of it. A spokeswoman reiterated her denial on Wednesday.

“As Sen. Clinton said to everyone months ago, her brother never discussed this with her and she knew nothing about it,” said the aide, Karen Dunne.

Sources close to the New York Democrat expressed irritation that Burton committee investigators were, as one put it, “excited about a note that isn’t signed or dated. The premise that Hillary knew or cared about a coke dealer in L.A. is bizarre.”

Several Democratic House aides characterized the latest development as Burton’s attempt to revive a flagging probe that in six months has uncovered few incriminating facts about Clinton’s eleventh-hour pardons. “The fishing expedition continues,” said one Democratic staffer.

But Republican aides close to the committee insisted Wednesday that the disclosure was “not an attempt to get at Hillary. Here we’ve got a real mystery document and we’re trying to find out what it means.”

Burton’s four-page letter to Rodham, written July 30 and containing 31 questions about the Vignali case, is part of his committee’s attempts to unravel at least a dozen controversial Clinton pardons--several of which are also being investigated by federal prosectors in New York.

Vignali’s prison commutation was one of 176 clemencies granted by Clinton on his last days in office. Vignali, 30, had been in several federal prisons for his role as financier in a drug ring that ferried cocaine from Los Angeles to Minneapolis.

Vignali’s father, a Los Angeles businessman, relied on his political and social connections and thousands of dollars in campaign contributions to help persuade civic, religious and elected officials to urge consideration of his son’s case. Among those who wrote letters on his son’s behalf were Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Los Angeles), then-L.A. mayoral candidate Antonio Villaraigosa, Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca and Cardinal Roger M. Mahony.

A Burton committee official said Wednesday that investigators are also pursuing leads in the clemencies granted to fugitive financier Marc Rich and Florida nutrition magnate Almon Glenn Braswell. They also are looking into whether Clinton’s brother, Roger, played a role in several other clemency requests.

In the July 30 letter to Rodham, Burton asked him if he had “any knowledge of whether Roger Clinton was involved in helping obtain a grant of clemency for Carlos Vignali.”

In recent weeks, the committee has been investigating Roger Clinton’s failed efforts to secure a clemency on behalf of Rosario Gambino, an imprisoned heroin trafficker and member of the New York Gambino crime family.