+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ The BIRCH BARK BBS / 414-242-5070 +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ Washington Inquirer ------------------- 08-05-94 -------- Aim Column Senators Fall Down On Fiske Job +++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++ by Reed Irvine and Joseph C. Goulden The Senate Banking Committee has blown what may be the last chance to get at the truth of the Vincent Foster death and to expose the fact that Robert Fiske can't be trusted to do a thorough, objective probe of Whitewater. In all the hours of testimony on July 29, not a single Senator brought up the fact that CW (the confidential witness) is adamant in stating there was no gun in Foster's hand when he discovered the body. The Senators evidently bought the Fiske report's claim that CW had retreated from his original story and had conceded that perhaps there was a gun in Foster's hand that he was unable to see because his view was blocked by foliage. Senators -and the media- should know better. Fiske has something in common with President Clinton, whose cause he is ably serving in his stumbling Whitewater investigation. With Fiske, as with Clinton, it is important to examine his statements with care. We have discussed in earlier columns how Fiske's report relies on an untenable theory to explain how Foster's face picked up a contact blood stain from his bloody shoulder and then assumed the upright position described by those who found the body. The Senators didn't even ask for the explanation, much less challenge it. Only one Senator, Robert Bennett (R.-Utah), apologetically asked about the blond hair and carpet fibers found on Foster's clothing. Like Fiske, he didn't mention that the hair and fibers were on his underwear and that there was also semen on his shorts. The FBI agents who testified admitted they made no effort to find where the hair and fibers had come from. No one challenged their claim that this would not have helped them find out if Foster committed suicide and why he did it. The FBI, like the Park Police, had decided before any investigation was made that Foster committed suicide. Satisfied that there was no foul play, they left the investigation up to the inept Park Police, who looked only for evidence that would confirm their verdict. The greatest challenge to that verdict was CW, the man who first found the body and who finally came forward to tell his story in late March. His story was a shocker, because he said that when he saw the body, the hands were at Foster's side, palms up and there was no gun in sight. The FBI found him credible, but to Fiske, who had already leaked word that his report would validate the findings of the Park Police, this meant that CW had to be persuaded to change his story. His report claims that CW did just that. Thanks to Rep. Dan Burton (R.-Ind.), we now know better. Burton and Sen. Lauch Faircloth (R.-N.C.) are apparently the only members of Congress with the courage to challenge Fiske. Burton did something which few members of the media have done. He double-checked Fiske's claim. Burton interviewed CW on July 21 and discovered that Fiske's claim that he had "changed" his story was based on deception. Burton said, "He said the FBI agents pressed him on the issue of the gun, asking him as many as 20 or 25 times if he was sure there was no gun in his hand." An agent asked, "What if the trigger guard was around the thumb and the thumb was obscured by foliage and the rest of the gun was obscured by the foliage and Mr. Foster's hand?" If this was true, CW said, he might not have seen the gun. That was all Fiske needed to suggest CW had acknowledged that he may not have seen the gun because it was obscured by foliage. But CW did not change his story that he had seen both hands, palms up. He said he came "to within 30 inches....of the body" and "looked right down into Mr. Foster's face." Burton showed CW a copy of the photograph that the White House leaked to ABC News last March. Burton says CW "became visibly angry and he told me that that was not what he saw at the crime scene, because the picture shows the gun in the hand underneath the hand with the palm down, and the gun partially obscured by Mr. Foster's body." CW also said that "at the bottom of the body, the vegetation had been trampled down like somebody had been walking or messing around that area for some time." He also told of a wine cooler bottle near the body. These points were related to the FBI. Fiske mentioned neither in his report. Burton put all this information -and much more- into the "Congressional Record" on July 26 (pp H6246-6251); it was also the subject of a Robert Novak column in the "Washington Post" on July 27. Incredibly, no one else in the media has pursued this major discrepancy in the Fiske report, and not a single Senator mentioned CW and exposed how Fiske had misrepresented his evidence. Sensitivity to the feelings of the Foster family is admirable, but ignoring outright misrepresentations and declaring a moratorium on the truth is not the way to honor Vincent Foster's memory. [end]