Roanoke Times
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: THURSDAY, February 24, 1994 TAG: 9402240193
SECTION: NATIONAL/INTERNATIONAL PAGE: A6 EDITION: NEW RIVER VALLEY
SOURCE: Associated Press
DATELINE: LITTLE ROCK, ARK. LENGTH: Medium
Six of the eight lawyers selected by Fiske are current or former prosecutors, and four have had high-profile successes in financial fraud cases.
Fiske wasted no time assigning new staff to early tasks in the wide-ranging probe of business deals involving the Clintons and other prominent Arkansans.
Roderick C. Lankler, a former assistant district attorney in Manhattan who prosecuted major murder cases, will oversee the investigation into deputy White House counsel Vincent Foster's suicide.
Foster was working on Whitewater matters for the Clintons at the time of his death last year.
Russell "Rusty" Hardin Jr., a Houston lawyer and former Texas state prosecutor of the year, was named lead prosecutor in the trial of ex-Judge David Hale, who has accused President Clinton of pressuring him to make a federally backed loan to a business associate.
Six other lawyers were named Wednesday. Fiske said he planned to add one or two more in several weeks.
In Washington, meanwhile, Republicans prepared for a long-awaited chance to question top administration officials about Whitewater at a Senate Banking Committee hearing today.
The hearing was designed to review the work of the Resolution Trust Corp., the nation's savings and loan cleanup agency. A key component of Whitewater is a failed Arkansas S&L operated by James McDougal, the Clintons' business partner in the real estate venture.
Committee Chairman Donald Riegle, D-Mich., has said members could ask questions about any failed institution.
And Sen. Alfonse D'Amato of New York, the committee's ranking Republican, has made clear he intends to ask acting RTC chief Roger Altman and other witnesses questions about Whitewater.
According to minority committee staff, GOP senators will demand to know:
What the RTC is doing to investigate possible civil wrongdoing in the failure of McDougal's Madison Guaranty S&L.
When the probe will be concluded and whether findings will be made public.
Whether the White House has interfered.
Democrats, hoping to curtail an embarrassing onslaught by the GOP, could launch a counterattack by noting the multibillion-dollar S&L debacle arose under Republican administrations.
Fiske said he would spend most of his time in Little Rock, where offices he has rented will accommodate seven lawyers, six financial analysts and 19 FBI agents.
by CNB