Word: merletti
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...they got only some of the answers. Clinton Administration lawyers brandished the privilege they are busy trying to invoke: officers will answer general questions about what they do and where and how, but the minute the queries turn penetrating, out comes the legal Kevlar. Lew Merletti, director of the Secret Service, has made it clear from the start that he will fight Starr all the way to the Supreme Court to prevent his agents from testifying in court. And Starr's prosecutors have been just as unyielding in carrying out their boss's vow to "run down every lead" about...
...coming days lawyers for both camps expect Judge Norma Holloway Johnson to schedule a hearing on Merletti's claim that there is a "protective function" privilege that excuses his officers from testifying in court. And, if only for effect, Administration lawyers have included in their legal briefs rare photos showing officers, acting on John F. Kennedy's orders, jumping off the rear bumper of his car just minutes before it entered its fatal swing through downtown Dallas in November 1963. Though Johnson's ruling on Merletti's claim is still weeks away, her decision is regarded as more pivotal...
...weeks Justice Department officials and Starr's lawyers have negotiated over whether officers and agents would testify. But the atmosphere for those talks may have been poisoned after Secret Service director Merletti learned that Starr was investigating rumors that the previous chief, Eljay Bowron, might have been forced out last year to make room for someone friendlier to Clinton, namely the 49-year-old Merletti. A 23-year veteran of the service, Merletti was troubled: Starr was chasing a conspiracy theory and had sent FBI agents to Bowron's house to try to prove it. Bowron, who had recommended Merletti...
...compelled to testify about whether they had witnessed a President committing a crime, such as taking a bribe. But a prosecutor wanting to know about, say, noncriminal caperings with an intern could be refused. "Proximity is the heart and soul of what we do," says Secret Service director Lewis Merletti, who pressed for the privilege. "It can't be compromised...
...their filing, Administration lawyers included a letter George Bush sent to Merletti in which the former President supported their argument. (In an accompanying letter, Bush noted that he also held Starr in high regard.) But the current President was keeping his distance from the whole dispute. White House press secretary Mike McCurry said Clinton had no position on the privilege. "We've got to stay 100 miles away from it," says a White House official. "Anything we say is seen through the prism of scandal...