Defense Attorney Terms Governor Bush's Reason Not to Serve on Jury "Laughable," Because "Everybody Understood [Bush] Just Didn't Want to Answer Questions About Drinking and Drugs"

Although Lawyer Gonzales Worked to Get the Governor Out of Jury Duty Inside the Courthouse,
Bush Told Media That He Was "Glad to Serve"

AUSTIN, Tex. -- Travis County's lead prosecutor on the 1996 drunk driving case in which Gov. George W. Bush was called as a potential juror now believes he was purposely misled by Bush and his attorney in an effort to avoid service. Ken Oden, a Democrat who has been the Travis County Attorney for 16 years, charged Saturday that Bush's failure to answer some of the questions on his jury questionnaire, coupled with his lawyer's efforts to get Bush excused because he might someday be called on to pardon the offender, were part of an effort to deceive prosecutors and others. [Bush's lawyer, Al Gonzales, was later appointed by him to the Texas Supreme Court.] Bush 'used his position as governor' to avoid having to answer potentially embarrassing questions about his past, Oden told Salon. 'I feel I was directly deceived....'

"At the time Bush was bounced from the jury pool, it was widely believed that he was looking to avoid questions about his hard-drinking past that would surely have come up during jury selection. The Houston Chronicle reported at the time that Bush's dismissal by the court was 'a development that allowed him to avoid potentially embarrassing questions about whether he had ever climbed behind the wheel after drinking....' During the 1996 jury selection process, Oden says, Lastovica, Gonzales, defense lawyer Wahlberg and Judge Crain met in Crain's chambers at the request of Gonzales. In chambers, Gonzales presented his pardon argument. A few minutes later, Lastovica presented the information to Oden for approval. Gonzales' pitch was a 'legal argument relating to his [Bush's] position as governor that none of us had ever heard,' recalled Oden. 'My response was, 'That's an unusual argument.' In 20 years of prosecuting in a town full of government officials, I'd never heard that position before.' 'Our position was that as a matter of courtesy to the governor we would not oppose his request for release from service. At that point, not knowing that he hadn't answered the questionnaire, or having other motives, he was released,' he said....

"The aggressive stance Bush took to avoid service stands in stark contrast to the just-folks story that he was feeding the media. When he first reported for jury duty at the Travis County Courthouse on Sept. 30, Bush told Wayne Slater of the Dallas Morning News, 'I'm glad to serve.' Bush added, 'I think it's important. It's one of the duties of citizenship.' He also told KVUE-TV in Austin, 'I'm just an average guy showing up for jury duty.' And in video footage shown by KVUE in 1996 and again on Friday night, Bush had some additional comments on his feelings regarding the case. The KVUE reporter asked Bush if he didn't 'really just want to give the guy a pardon and go home?' Bush, who has presided over a staggering 145 executions as governor, answered, 'No, I probably want to hang him and go home.' For the record, Maine abolished the death penalty in 1887, 89 years before an inebriated Bush was apprehended while driving near Kennebunkport." --Robert Bryce, 11/5/00

JURY QUESTIONNAIRE (HERE) SHOWS BUSH DIDN'T TELL THE TRUTH

CNN reported this evening that Georg W. Bush was sent an official jury duty form to fill out in 1996. A jury form in Travis County, Texas, looks like a folded postcard and, in order to speed things up, the person called is asked to answer a number of quesions in advance of actually reaching the court house at the requested time. Bush filled out the form, but according to CNN, left a number of spaces blank, including spaces for answers about his criminal record. When you get to the courst house a clerk collects the questionnaires and gives them to the lawyers to look through as a preliminary way of weeding out applicants with criminal records, among other things. Since Bush had previously pled guilty to a Class D misdemeanor in Maine, some might conclude that his unwillingness to fill out the relevant spaces on the questionnaire indicated he didn't desire to have that part of his background made public. However, his lawyer argued that being on the jury would create an official conflict for the governor. This may be so, but one imagines some will always wonder what role, if any, Bush's criminal record had in his decision., and whether such a consideration would constitute a conflict of interest. --Politex, 11/3/00

"Mr. Bush was called for jury service in a 1996 drunken-driving case in Austin but was dismissed from the panel before the potential jury members were questioned about their histories of drinking and driving. P. David Wahlberg, the defense attorney who struck Mr. Bush from the 1996 jury panel, said Thursday that he did so after the governor and the governor's lawyer asked the judge to excuse Mr. Bush. Mr. Bush had initially said he would perform jury service, Mr. Wahlberg said. But, he said, on the eve of trial, the governor's lawyer, Al Gonzales – later appointed by Mr. Bush to the Texas Supreme Court – asserted that it would be improper for a governor to sit on a criminal case in which he could later be asked to grant clemency." --Dallas Morning News, 11/3/00

"After the jury dismissal, Texas reporters asked Bush if he ever had been arrested for drunk driving. Bush replied: "I do not have a perfect record as a youth. When I was young, I did a lot of foolish things." [The DWI arrest happened when Bush was 30 years old.] --Washington Post, 11/3/00

BUSH TEAM DISCUSSED DRUNK ANSWER "FOR YEARS"

According to a story in the Boston Globe this morning, a Maine man said he was in court in 1976 when George W. Bush was present to answer to his DWI charge. This confirms our assertion (see next story) that, based on the docket records, Bush lied at his press conference Thursday evening when he indicated that his DWI charge was taken care of on the evening it happened and that he never appeared in court. Further, Boston Globe reporters Stephen A. Kurkjian and David Armstrong imply that Bush lied another time when he participated in a hearing with Maine officials in a successful attempt to regain his right to drive in Maine, two years after the DWI infraction. Bush's "comments, made in a 1978 hearing conducted by telephone, clash with the presidential candidate's more recent recountings of his drinking habits at that time in his life." Another point made in the story continues to baffle us. People who lived in Maine in the '70's indicate that Bush's infraction would not have been taken as seriously then as it would be taken today. Having said that, why was Bush given such a lengthy suspension of his license for a fist-time DWI. Even today, a first-time DWI only merits a 90-day suspension. Also, in 1976 would a first-time DWI be forced to complete a driver rehabilitation course prior to having his suspension lifted? Nothing in Maine's 1997 laws indicates such a requirement. Excerpts from their story follow. --Politex, 11/4/00

"Bush confirmed Thursday that he was arrested in Kennebunkport, Maine, following a night of drinking with three friends and his sister Dorothy. Bush, who was 30 at the time, pleaded guilty, paid a $150 fine, and had his right to drive suspended.... The 1978 reinstatement hearing took place after Bush, in a handwritten letter to state authorities, said he was unable to complete a required driver rehabilitation course because he lived in Texas. In the letter, he said he hoped to be able to drive again in Maine as a ''tourist.'' Maine regulations allowed for him to be reinstated without taking the course, but doubled the length of time he had to wait before seeking to restore his right to drive....

"In a plea to win back his right to drive in Maine following his 1976 conviction for drunken driving, George W. Bush portrayed himself as a casual drinker, saying he drank ''infrequently'' and had an ''occasional beer,'' according to an official handwritten notation in Maine state records. His comments, made in a 1978 hearing conducted by telephone, clash with the presidential candidate's more recent recountings of his drinking habits at that time in his life. Bush said he stopped drinking in 1986 and has not had any alcohol since. But he has acknowledged a hard-drinking past that came to interfere with his life, though he has not been specific about how often he drank. His comments in the 1978 hearing cast his consumption of alcohol in the softest of terms. Notes from the hearing officer, included in records released by the state to the Globe, note that Bush said he drank about once a month and ''infrequently.'' The hearing officer, David Schulz, also noted that Bush said he drank an ''occasional beer.'' Following the hearing, Bush's right to drive in Maine was reinstated. In various interviews, Bush has said he stopped drinking when he turned 40 and realized the toll alcohol was taking on his life. In September, he said ''alcohol was beginning to compete for my affections for my wife and my family.'' In another interview with the Washington Post, Bush gave the following answer when asked if he had ever participated in Alcoholics Anonymous: ''I didn't ... I don't think I was clinically an alcoholic; I didn't have the genuine addiction. I don't know why I drank. I liked to drink, I guess.'' The Bush campaign yesterday did not respond to a request to reconcile such remarks with the self-description Bush offered the state hearing officer in 1978.....

"It began Thursday morning when a Maine man, who said he had been in Biddeford District Court on the same day in 1976 that Bush appeared to answer to the drunken driving charge, remarked to his chiropractor that he didn't understand how the arrest escaped attention by the media. Until Thursday, there had been only one other request for Bush's driving record in Maine, said Wyke, the Maine official. That request, made Oct. 23 by a man with a Phoenix address, asked for a copy of Bush's record during the past 10 years. Because the drunken driving arrest dated back more than two decades, the man was told the Texas governor's record was spotless. Many media outlets had requested copies of Bush's Texas driving records before Thursday, but because the charge in Maine was more than 10 years old, it would not have shown up on the Texas files, said a spokesman for the Texas Department of Public Safety. And in Maine, driving under the influence at that time was considered a type of traffic offense, said Mark Lavoie, president of the Maine State Bar Association. ''It was worse than a speeding ticket certainly, but far less than what it is today,'' he said. William Head, an attorney who wrote a book on drunken driving defense strategies, said the era in which Bush was arrested could have made it easier for him to avoid the conviction."

On your left is Docket #76/7-02342 an official record of George W. Bush's legal activities that followed from his DWI arrest in 9/4/76. (Posted at CNN.) Below are excerpts from his 11/2/00 press conference in which he admitted that reports eralier in the evening were correct. As you can see, Bush lied three times, if the docket record is to be believed. He implied that he paid the fine at the police station. The docket record says he paid the fine over a month later, on 10/15/76. He said that there were no legal proceedings of an kind, but the docket says he was scheduled for hearings on 9/16/76 and 10/15/76 and was given two continuances along the way, one to 9/30/76, the other to 10/25/76. The 10/15/76 hearing coincides with the date the fine was paid . He said there was no court hearing. The docket record indicates two hearing dates. He said neither he nor his family took any action after that night. Action of some sort had to be taken with respect to the continuances, the hearings, the paying of the fine, and the return of the $500 bond which one supposes must have been provided so Bush would not have to spend time in jail. Even if Poppy simply cut Junior off, which is unlikely, Bush or a legal representative must have been required to attend the hearing , pay the fine, and have the bond returned. Bush could probably provide some sort of explanation for all of these contradictions, but the fact is he didn't do so during his press conference. Reporters and viewers left the conference thinking that Bush was arrested and taken to the police station where he paid his fine and that was the end of the story, because that's what Bush said or implied. Bush lied.--Politex, 11/4/00

Bush: There's a report out tonight that 24 years ago I was apprehended in Kennebunkport, Maine, for a DUI. That's an accurate story. ...I was pulled over. I admitted to the policeman that I had been drinking. I paid a fine....
Reporter: Could you tell us some more about the night that you spent some time in jail? Did you --
Bush: No, I didn't spend any night in jail there. I did not spend ....
[inaudible question from a reporter]
Bush: No, none at all. None whatsoever. As a matter of fact, I, you know, I tried -- I mean, I -- listen, I told the guy I had been drinking and what do I need to do? And he said, "Here's the fine." I paid the fine and did my duty....
Reporter: Governor, was there any legal proceeding of any kind? Or did you just --
Bush: No. I pled -- you know, I said I was wrong and I ...
Reporter: In court?
Bush: No, there was no court. I went to the police station. I said, "I'm wrong."
Reporter: So you just had a [inaudible]?
Bush: Yes.
Reporter: For the same night.
Bush: Yes, I did....
Reporter: Is there any action that you or your family took after that night?
Bush: No, there's not. I mean, none.

Sources told MSNBC.com’s Jeannette Walls that Bush associates had been worried for several years about his arrest record and had hoped that because it was in Maine, and not Texas, it wouldn’t surface. The sources said Bush took one step to keep it under wraps in March 1995, when his driver’s license number was changed. Walls first reported this in August 1999 in The Scoop, an MSNBC.com column. At the time, the sources told Walls that Bush got his license number changed because he was worried about an arrest record surfacing. “He has an arrest record that has to do with drinking,” a source said then. “He’s worried it will come out, but his handlers keep assuring him it won’t.”

The allegation was not disclosed by MSNBC.com at the time because the arrest could not be confirmed. Also in August 1999, the Texas Department of Motor Vehicles told MSNBC.com that changing one’s driver’s license number was “highly unusual” and that it is done only when the holder of the license can prove that someone is using the license number for illegal activities. Repeated calls to Bush’s camp back at the time were unanswered, until a spokeswoman for Bush said the motor vehicle agency would have an additional comment. An agency spokesman then called MSNBC and said Bush’s license number was changed for “security measures.” He declined to comment further. In light of Bush’s admission of his arrest, a second source said Friday: “Bush’s people didn’t want to comment [in August 1999] because they didn’t want to be on the record lying or misleading anyone about this.”

. “A lot of people had heard about [Bush’s arrest record], but they were looking for documents or some sort of evidence in Texas,” the second source said. Bush’s camp “was keeping their fingers crossed that nothing would come out because the record was in Maine and Bush’s license number had been changed.” Neither of Walls’ sources is connected to Gore’s campaign or to the Democratic Party. --MSNBC,11/3/00

Writing in the LOS ANGELES TIMES last week, USC Journalism Lecturer Norman Miller commented on such concerns by asking, "If the cocaine-rumor story is valid, where does it end? Bush has admitted he was a heavy drinker until he swore off when he turned 40. Did he drive under the influence, an action probably more endangering to others than using cocaine? God save us from some scandal-hungry reporter asking that question, even though its hypothetical foundation surpasses the cocaine question." --Politex, 8/31/99

As a result of George W. Bush's DWI arrest in 1976 at the age of 30, his Maine driver's license was suspended for two years, according to a Fox News statement reported in the DMN today by Wayne Slater. According to Bob Michaud, Associate Law Librarian for the Law Library of the State of Maine,"In 1976 under title 29 Maine Revised Statutes Annotated section 1312 subsection 10, the penalty for a first time offense was 'shall be punished by a fine of not more than $1,000 or by imprisonment for not more than 90 days, or by both.' (29 MRSA section 1312(10) 1975-76 Cumulative Pocket Part, West Publishing)." As we know, Bush was fined $150 dollars and served no time, but he had to post a bond of $500. While Bush said he did not attend a court hearing during last night's hectic interview with reporters, time may show that statement to be incorrect. Meanwhile, today's law for first-time drunk driving includes a 90-day suspension of license. While the Kennebunkport police reported that Bush's suspension was for 30 days, both the State of Maine document (see below) and Fox News indicates that the suspension was actually for two years. This is not a penalty for first-time DWI offenders, leaving one to wonder what the circumstances really were. Mr. Bush should explain himself. --Politex, 11/3/00

Last evening [key Bush aid Mark] "McKinnon, who wouldn't say whether he had known of the arrest previously, did allow that the story could become more of a problem for the governor if it surfaced that he had ever lied about the arrest.

"And by [this] morning, it began to look as though Bush had, in at least one instance, lied about it. In the media's breakfast room, Wayne Slater, a reporter with the Dallas Morning News, confirmed an account, first mentioned in the New Republic, that in the fall of 1998 Bush had lied to him about whether he'd ever been arrested after 1968. In the midst of Bush's gubernatorial reelection effort, Slater reported that while in college, Bush had been arrested for stealing a Christmas wreath from a New Haven, Conn., hotel. Cornering Bush in the press room of the State Capitol in Austin, Texas, after a press conference, Slater pressed Bush on his arrest record.

"'I asked him if he'd ever been arrested after 1968,' when the wreath incident took place, Slater recalled. 'And he said, 'No.'' Slater emphasized the context of the conversation, however, and his gut feeling now that Bush was on the brink of disclosing the 1976 drunken-driving arrest to him. 'When he said the word 'no,' clearly he wasn't telling the truth,' Slater said. But, Slater said, he then asked Bush if 'had he ever been arrested before 1968, and he said, 'Well ...,' and I felt he may have been ready to correct what he had just said, but [Bush spokeswoman] Karen Hughes stepped in and stopped the interview.'" --Jake Tapper, 11/3/00

1. "Bush's comments were off the record." (Translation. Bush lied but Reporter Wayne Slater was not supposed to report it.)

2. Slater "never wrote about the comments." (Translation. Bush lied but Slater did not write about it in a story of his own. See NR, 9/28/00.)

3. "Hughes said her staff had checked past public statements and found that the only time Bush was asked if he had been arrested was in 1996, and that his response was, 'I do not have a perfect record as a youth.'" (Translation. Bush lied, but for unexplained reasons Hughes' staff did not find Slater's question and Bush's response in the New Republic story. (See #2 above.) MSNBC, 11/3/00

FIRST-TIME OUI PENALTY?

Although Fox51 News in Maine has the Kennebunkport police reporting that Bush's Maine driver's license was suspended for 30 days, the document on the left from the State of Maine (at The Smoking Gun) appears to suggest otherwise. As you can see, the license suspension was made "indefinite" on 10/26/76, eleven days after the drunk driving arrest and conviction, and "indefinite eligibility" was "restored on 7/25/78, in the middle of his Congressional campaign. Also, note that "violation free credits" occurred on 12/31/93 at right around the time Bush was gearing up to run for Governor of Texas. Mr. Bush should be asked to explain the meaning and significance of the dates, and to explain what these dates have to do with a supposed first-time OUI.

According to the 1997 Maine laws, "For a person having no previous OUI offenses within a 10-year period: (1) A fine of not less than $400, except that if the person failed to submit to a test, a fine of not less than $500; (2) A court-ordered suspension of a driver's license for a period of 90 days...." An indefinite suspension, a fine of $150, and the posting of a $500 bond does not sound right for a firt-time OUI penalty in 1976. Something's not making sense, here. --Politex, 11/3/00

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BUSH CAMP DISPUTES, BUT DOES NOT EXPLAIN, LIE #2 (BELOW)

1. BUSH LIED ON "MEET THE PRESS," 11/21/99

TIM RUSSERT: If someone came to you and said, "Governor, I'm sorry, I'm going to go public with some information." What do you do?

GOV. BUSH: If someone was willing to go public with information that was damaging, you'd have heard about it by now. You've had heard about it now. My background has been scrutinized by all kinds of reporters. Tim, we can talk about this all morning.

2. BUSH LIED TO "DALLAS MORNING NEWS," 1998

"Just after the governor's reelection in 1998, [Dallas Morning News reporter Wayne] Slater pressed Bush about whether he had ever been arrested. 'He said, "After 1968? No."'" New Republic

3. BUSH LIED TO CBS, 1999.

"Bush has often acknowledged past mistakes, but CBS News Correspondent Lee Cowan reports that in a 1999 interview with CBS station WBZ in Boston, he denied there was any so-called smoking gun." CBS

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Dubya's Drunken Driving Raises Bigger Questions

Let's be realistic: The brouhaha over Dubya's DUI isn't about a 24-year-old drunk-driving bust. It's about how little American voters know about this man and the many questions about him that remain unanswered. When Gov. George W. Bush first hinted about a presidential run, the presidential scion was applauded for his candor about "his troubled youth." But questions about details were answered with "when I was young and irresponsible, I was young and irresponsible," a mantra that won him a bye on critical matters.Bush flatly refused to answer questions related to cocaine, though he was eager to talk about the redemption that led him to quit alcohol at age 40. Now we learn that when Bush spoke about seeing the light, he never mentioned that it was a flashing red one 10 years before he supposedly stopped drinking. In 1996, when he was called for jury duty, his attorney (whom Bush later made Supreme Court Justice Al Gonzales) argued that since the governor might be asked to grant clemency, the potential conflict should excuse him. And on his prospective juror form, Bush skipped questions about his criminal record.Once off the pool, reporters asked Bush about his own arrests, and the Washington Post quoted him saying: "I do not have a perfect record as a youth. When I was young, I did a lot of foolish things."

In 1998, Dallas Morning News reporter Wayne Slater specifically asked Bush about his arrest record after information surfaced that he was arrested for disorderly conduct in 1966 when, as a student at Yale, he was busted for snatching a Christmas wreath in New Haven, Conn. "Asked whether he had been arrested on anything 'after 1968,'" Slater wrote, "the governor replied, 'No.'" Slater recalled that Bush seemed ready to change his response when Karen Hughes, his spokeswoman, stopped the conversation. After a Maine TV reporter broke the DUI story Thursday, Bush initially questioned the story's timing before Hughes stepped in to tell reporters that Dubya had been totally open about his past and hadn't spoken of this bust because he wasn't asked.

When Slater disputed this, Hughes first said that his 1998 interview was off the record, but Slater denied that too, Jake Tapper reported for Salon.com. Hughes then said that since Slater's interview hadn't been reported, the governor was still clean. But Slater's account was reported in a New Republic bio of Hughes. Hughes finally defended Bush's truthfulness, Tapper added, by saying that since Slater "was left with the impression that there had been some sort of incident — an accurate — a truthful impression that there had been ..." another arrest."

Come on. The truth is that Bush's warts and blemished past have been shielded by an overzealous staff quick to loudly denounce any unwelcome questions as personal intrusions. Before Tuesday, Bush should fully explain this and any other arrests and flatly deny or admit his use of drugs. Bush should also answer charges detailed by the Boston Globe that while in the Texas Air National Guard he was missing for at least a year before he was given an early honorable discharge.

He is, after all, interviewing for the job of president and commander-in-chief. --Carlos Guerra, San Antonio Express-News, 11/5/00

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"AT AGE 30 THIS IS NO 'YOUTHFUL INDESCRETION'"--BILL SCHNEIDER, CNN

IS THIS WHY BUSH GOT A NEW TEXAS DRIVER'S LICENSE WHEN HE BECAME TEXAS GOVERNOR?

IS THIS WHY BUSH'S DRIVER'S RECORD WAS EXPUNGED?

REPORTERS ASK, "WHAT ELSE IT THERE?

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MAINE ARREST CARD SHOWS MIDLAND, TEXAS ADDRESS

BUSH DRINKING VIDEO, AUGUST 29, 1992.

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OUR AUGUST '99 BUSH LICENSE STORY

MORE ON THE BUSH DRIVER'S LICENSE STORY

According to Fox News, Bush's driving privileges were only revoked in Maine and his Texas driver's license was neither revoked nor suspended. Why then, upon becoming Texas governor, did he get a new driver's license number and have his previous driving record expunged?

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WHY BUSH IS A HYPOCRITE...

George W. Bush was arrested in 1976 in the state of Maine at the age of 30 for driving under the influence. He pled guilty to the charge, paid a $150 fine, and had his driver's privilege suspended. Shocked Republicans wonder why he didn't come clean on his own, and now wonder what else he may be hiding. How in the world can he attack Gore for character flaws while not telling the truth about his own? The story was released by a Maine TV station, and Bush was powerless to spin it. What more is Bush hiding? --Politex, 7:25 CT, 11/2/00

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