February 7, 1996
Web posted at: 9 p.m. EST
WASHINGTON (CNN) -- Hillary Rodham Clinton's former law partner Webster Hubbell testified before the Senate Whitewater Committee Wednesday, answering questions as to what might have happened to the first lady's legal billing records that mysteriously appeared last month.
When Sen. Richard Shelby asked Hubbell where the records were kept from February 1992 until they were found, Hubbell said he had "no idea." (102K AIFF sound or 102K WAV sound)
He said he believed the records were kept at the Rose Law Firm, where he and Mrs. Clinton were partners, but did not know when the records disappeared from the firm.
Michael Chertoff, the lawyer for committee Republicans, said Hubbell's description two years ago to federal regulators of work done by Mrs. Clinton's law firm for Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan was "not ... accurate."
Chertoff said Hubbell, as the associate attorney general and a former chief justice of the Arkansas Supreme Court, had a duty to disclose the Rose Law Firm's work on Castle Grande, a money-losing vacation development. James McDougal, head of Madison Guaranty Savings and Loan, and his wife were partners with the Clintons in the money-losing vacation development.
Investigators later determined that the transactions involving that thousand-acre real estate project south of Little Rock amounted to a fraudulent scheme designed to benefit McDougal associate Seth Ward.
Responding to Chertoff, Hubbell defended his description to federal regulators of Rose's work, saying he told them everything he could recall.
Chertoff pressed him, pointing out that Hubbell had examined the firm's billing records during the 1992 presidential campaign.
Hubbell acknowledged that he and Vincent Foster, the deputy White House counsel who committed suicide in 1993, examined the records during the presidential campaign. Foster had custody of the records at that time, according to Hubbell.
Hubbell's testimony came about as a result of the sudden appearance of the billing records outlining the firm's and Mrs. Clinton's work for the troubled S&L.
Mrs. Clinton has said her work for Madison was minimal, but Republicans say the records suggest she did considerable work on questionable real estate activities by Madison, including Castle Grande.
Hubbell, Foster, and the aide who discovered the files, Carolyn Huber, came from the Rose firm to Washington with the Clintons.
Asked for his reaction to the discovery of the records, Hubbell said, "I kind of smiled." He said he knew Huber and was not surprised that it was Huber who found them.
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