Lewinsky to testify in Tripp wiretap case

ELLICOTT CITY, Maryland -- Monica Lewinsky will testify Thursday at a hearing to determine whether Linda Tripp should be tried for secretly recording their telephone conversations, sources with the Lewinsky legal team told CNN late Wednesday.

In court Wednesday, lawyers argued over the legitimacy of the tapes as evidence because Tripp was granted immunity from prosecution only after agreeing to provide them to Independent Counsel Ken Starr.

Starr, appointed to pursue the lengthy Whitewater probe, was also looking into whether Clinton lied about his involvement with Lewinsky in a deposition taken during the Paula Jones sexual case.

Prosecutors tried to show they have evidence other than the tapes to make their case.

The tapes were the main evidence used in the Starr report to Congress that led to the impeachment of President Bill Clinton.

But state prosecutors said they consider grand jury testimony by four women that Tripp discussed recording the Lewinsky conversations at bridge club meetings and other social gatherings to be first-hand accounts that she engaged in illegal wiretapping.

One of the women, bridge club member Katherine Manweller, testified she saw the tape-recording equipment in a visit to Tripp's home.

At Wednesday's hearing, Tripp attorneys Joseph Murtha and David Irwin managed to get the women to concede that their testimony about what Tripp said may have been influenced by news media accounts of the Starr investigation and the impeachment proceedings before Congress.

The telephone conversations, taped by Tripp at her home in Maryland without Lewinsky's knowledge or consent, detail the former White House intern's illicit relationship with the president. Maryland law prohibits such recordings unless both parties consent.

Murtha read a statement Wednesday that Tripp "would never have voluntarily waived her constitutional rights" when she provided the tapes to Starr's office if she had known she could be prosecuted at the state level, despite the immunity against prosecution at the federal level.

Howard County Circuit Judge Diane Leasure ruled Tuesday that Tripp's immunity deal with Starr was not approved by a federal judge until a month after the agreement was reached, in February 1998, and did not cover the playing of the tapes for Newsweek earlier in January.

This means state prosecutors can use the tapes as evidence against Tripp. Though he protested the ruling, Murtha said the defense would now focus on thwarting "the state's attempt to prove that their investigation did not rely in any way on the fruit of the federal investigation."

Maryland State Prosecutor Stephen Montanarelli testified Wednesday his office "could have done more" to make certain its evidence was not linked to sources protected by Tripp's grant of immunity.

But in addition to the testimony from Tripp's bridge club friends, Montanarelli said a Radio Shack manager and sales clerk both told the grand jury that they warned Tripp about Maryland's wiretapping law when they sold her the tape recording equipment.

The hearing will determine if the state evidence against Tripp has been tainted by any connection with immunized sources. If she is tried and then convicted, she faces fines of up to $20,000 and a maximum 10-year prison term.

RELATED STORIES

Judge rules Tripp lacks immunity in case (12-14-99) Hearing could determine if Tripp case goes to trial (12-13-99) Lawyer says Lewinsky probably will be pretrial witness (12-10-99)

Lewinsky to testify in Tripp wiretap case

By Paul Courson/CNN

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Wednesday, December 15, 1999