THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1997, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Monday, January 20, 1997 TAG: 9701180040
SECTION: FRONT PAGE: A11 EDITION: FINAL
TYPE: Opinion
SOURCE: ANN SJOERDSMA
LENGTH: 93 lines
Paula Jones' ``sexual harassment'' lawsuit has troubled me since she filed it in May 1994.
Not because I think Jones is a two-bit hussy out to shake down the venerable president of the United States. I don't.
I believe Jones' claim that then-Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton brutishly came on to her May 8, 1991, in a Little Rock hotel room, exposing the now much-talked-about ``distinguishing characteristics in his genital area.''
And not because I'm a Clinton Democrat or because I think that the president should be immune from civil suits arising from his private actions. I'm not. I don't. (The Supreme Court will draw lines.)
Why then? Because of the law that underlies - or doesn't underlie - Jones' case.
Long ago, reporters should have queried legal experts about the complaint that Jones' self-described Virginia ``country lawyers,'' Gilbert K. Davis and Joseph Cammarata, filed in Arkansas federal court. Instead, they got hung up on partisan politics, the immunity issue, the election, the legal maneuvering. Everything but the law.
The complaint (which I retrieved from the Internet) is garbage. To say this case has holes is to say that the Titanic had a small leak.
What's more, it reads like ``True Confessions,'' complete with salacious dialogue and play-by-play. It was written for media exploitation.
The hard truth is that Jones lost her right to sue for sexual harassment - at least as lawyers understand it - under Title VII of the 1964 Civil Rights Act because she didn't act quickly enough. Such claims must be filed with the U.S. Equal Employment Opportunity Commission within 180 days of the alleged harassment. (Women, take note.) Jones waited three years.
Actually, she wasn't waiting. After Clinton's alleged come-on, Jones married, had a baby, took maternity leave, quit her job (all within about 21 months), moved to California. She spoke out only because ``Trooper-gate'' hit the conservative American Spectator in December 1993, and a woman named ``Paula'' was quoted as wanting to be Bill's girl.
Upset, Jones went to an Arkansas lawyer with dollar signs for scruples; he engineered her humiliating debut Feb. 11, 1994, at a right-wing press conference. All Jones has ever wanted, she says, is a public apology from Clinton.
OK, so if Jones can't claim sexual harassment, what is she claiming?
Intentional infliction of emotional distress and ``defamation.'' They're two state torts that are commonly used in harassment scenarios. But they're hard to prove. Especially absent a Title VII claim.
Jones' complaint is rife with vague, incomplete and contradictory facts; her tort claims weak, at best. Accusing Clinton of battery (in this instance, an intentional offensive touching) would have been a better option, since he allegedly caressed and kissed Jones. But its statute of limitations ran out.
But here's the truly absurd part of Jones' suit: She also alleges that Clinton and co-defendant Danny Ferguson, the ex-trooper/bodyguard who allegedly escorted Jones to the governor's hotel room and blabbed to the Spectator, violated her civil rights. Which ones? The catch-all equal protection and due process, of course.
Fairfax lawyers Davis, a conservative Republican running for Virginia attorney general, and Cammarata, of the same political leaning, dug down deep for this nonsense. Real deep. Down to two Reconstruction-era civil rights laws, enacted to thwart state ``Black Codes'' that restricted freedoms of African Americans.
One law kicks in only if Clinton was acting ``under color of law'' - not as a private citizen - when he somehow (Tell me how!) discriminated against Jones.
The other law requires proof of a ``conspiracy'' between Clinton and Ferguson to purposely deprive Jones of her rights.
I defy any constitutional lawyer to figure this mess out. Or to make sense of this ``legal'' statement:
``Plaintiff, as a citizen and Arkansas state employee, was entitled to due process protection of freedom from arbitrary action which jeopardized her property interest in her public employee job in that she should not have been subjected arbitrarily to the fear of losing that job or of having to provide sex to the Governor as a quid pro quo for keeping the job.''
After their Supreme Court argument last Monday, Davis and Cammarata challenged Clinton-friendly women's groups to get behind Paula Jones. Well, I'm a feminist and I support Jones, but her case stinks. It's not about sexual harassment; it's about opportunistic, manipulative lawyers who want a crack at the president and national notoriety and are using a trusting, naive, young woman to do it.
Even if Title VII limitations hadn't expired, Jones would have had a weak case. Sexual harassment consists of unwelcome sexual advances or other sexual conduct that either (1) forms the basis for granting or withholding job benefits (quid pro quo harassment) or (2) creates a hostile and offensive working environment. Clinton hardly applied quid pro quo coercion, though Jones' lawyers toss such Title VII innuendo into her complaint.
Paula Jones was abused first in a hotel room and then later in a lawyer's office. In my humble opinion, her case is headed for early dismissal. But not before further muddying the already muddy waters of ``sexual harassment.'' MEMO: Ann G. Sjoerdsma, an attorney, is an editorial columnist and book
editor for The Virginian-Pilot.