U.S. Atty. Pursued Clemency Case

The federal prosecutor whose office won a conviction of Carlos Vignali on narcotics charges in 1994 said Monday that he received two telephone calls from Alejandro N. Mayorkas, the U.S. attorney in Los Angeles, asking about the extent of Vignali’s involvement in a drug ring that stretched from California to Minnesota.

Todd Jones, the U.S. attorney in Minnesota, said he received the calls from Mayorkas in early 1999.

Former officials in the Clinton White House, meantime, said that a favorable recommendation from a U.S. attorney was a key factor in the former president’s decision to commute the 15-year prison sentence of the convicted drug trafficker on Clinton’s last day in office.

In Southern California, some civic leaders, including Cardinal Roger M. Mahony, expressed regret that they might have helped Vignali win commutation. Mahony issued a statement apologizing for writing a letter on behalf of the young man, and former California Assembly Speaker Antonio Villaraigosa said in an interview that he should not have intervened in the matter. Rep. Xavier Becerra (D-Los Angeles) said he had relied on Justice Department information in asking the White House to give Vignali’s commutation petition a close review.

The former Clinton White House officials, who said they could not remember the identity of the U.S. attorney who intervened on Vignali’s behalf, said that such an endorsement is essential if any request for presidential clemency is to be approved.

Mayorkas, asked twice Monday about his role in the Vignali case, repeatedly declined to discuss the matter. “I’m not going to comment,” he said.

In Minneapolis, Jones said that Mayorkas called him as he was sending a formal letter to the pardon attorney’s office in Washington urging that Vignali’s sentence not be commuted. Mayorkas told him he was calling at the behest of Vignali’s father, Horacio, who was urging a number of California political figures for help in getting his son out of prison, Jones said.

“He was checking up on what the case was all about,” Jones said of Mayorkas.

“Why? Because the old man was calling him. Horacio was contacting Ali and his U.S. attorney’s office seeking support for a commutation.”

It is highly unusual for a U.S. attorney to intervene in any case outside his own district.

Mayorkas, told what Jones and others were saying about him, said: “People are going to be saying things.” He added that he has a record of not publicly commenting on presidential pardons or commutations.

It remained unclear whether Mayorkas ever did anything to directly help Carlos Vignali win commutation on Jan. 20. On that day, the convicted drug dealer walked out of prison after serving six years of his 15-year term.

It is official Justice Department policy to refuse to release any information from pardon and commutation petitions, even after they are approved.

On Monday, former officials of the Clinton White House said that all of the paperwork associated with the 140 pardons and 36 commutations Clinton granted on Jan. 20 has been shipped to Little Rock, Ark., and will not be available for inspection until his presidential library opens in several years.

But the officials, who asked not to be identified, did offer a general overview of White House handling of Vignali’s request for commutation. They said that John Podesta, Clinton’s chief of staff, did not recall the Vignali petition, while Deputy White House Counsel Bruce Lindsey had some recollection of the matter.

They said Lindsey remembered that the file included a letter from a U.S. attorney who noted that while Vignali seemed to be guilty of supplying more than 800 pounds of cocaine to a multistate drug ring, his sentence seemed excessive.

The former Clinton officials said Lindsey did not remember that the elder Vignali had been a major contributor to Democratic Party committees and candidates. Indeed, Horacio Vignali began contributing tens of thousands of dollars to political campaigns after his son was imprisoned.

On Monday, the father declined to comment on whether he personally urged Mayorkas to help. “I can’t tell you anything,” he said.

As he did last week, the senior Vignali portrayed himself as a grateful father glad to have his son returned to his family.

“I am very happy the community came together and helped my son,” he said. “I’m happy the president did the right thing.”

Last week, he insisted that he asked no one to lobby on his son’s behalf and that any help was offered independently. But many of the politicians and others who supported the commutation said otherwise, contending that Horacio Vignali had urged them for assistance.

Donald Re, a Los Angeles attorney who unsuccessfully appealed Carlos Vignali’s conviction on three federal narcotics counts, also recalled how much support Horacio Vignali was drumming up for his son.

“I don’t think Horacio would know how to orchestrate a commutation,” Re said. “But he was constantly talking to anybody to help his son. He was looking for any avenue to try and help his son out.

“And somebody had to carry it to the president or the president’s people,” Re added. “Who was that?”

Even Jones, the Minnesota prosecutor, said he got the clear impression that Mayorkas was under heavy pressure from Horacio Vignali.

Jones said Mayorkas told him that the elder Vignali “was a player in the community in Los Angeles, a pillar in the community,” adding that he knew from others who had contacted him that Vignali “was a player in the community.”

“He was just checking to make sure that we hadn’t changed our mind on any level,” Jones said of Mayorkas’ calls. “My impression was the dad was pushing.”

Margaret Love, the U.S. pardon attorney from 1990 to 1997, questioned why the federal prosecutor in Los Angeles would inject himself into a case that was tried in Minnesota.

“The U.S. attorney in Los Angeles should have had no role,” she said. “It’s peculiar for him to become involved at all. What business is it of his?”

Mayorkas, who was appointed by Clinton in December 1998, has a reputation of being politically savvy--and extremely ambitious--as well as being a tough prosecutor, particularly on issues of white-collar crime.

As questions about the case continue to arise, Rep. Becerra labored Monday to contain the damage to his Los Angeles mayoral campaign, even as he tried to convince supporters and voters that he had not requested the drug dealer’s freedom but had tried only to bring the Vignali case to Clinton’s attention.

Becerra said that his initial contact with the Justice Department was aimed at learning whether there was a chance Carlos Vignali could win commutation. “I knew the bare facts, what I knew from” the father, Becerra said.

Others who wrote letters on Vignali’s behalf included Becerra’s mayoral opponent, former U.S. Rep. Esteban Torres, as well as Los Angeles County Sheriff Lee Baca and Mahony.

The cardinal agonized Monday, saying in a statement that he had made “a serious mistake” in writing the president on Vignali’s behalf. Mahony said he had been approached by unnamed persons urging him to write to Clinton, even though he did not know Carlos Vignali.

*

Times staff writers Matea Gold, Josh Meyer, Larry B. Stammer and Nora Zamichow in Los Angeles contributed to this story.