Path: bloom-picayune.mit.edu!snorkelwacker.mit.edu!americast.com!americast.com!americast-post Newsgroups: americast.twt.news From: americast-post@AmeriCast.Com Organization: American Cybercasting Approved: americast-post@AmeriCast.com Subject: Weinberger seeks dismissal of indictment Date: Sun, 15 Nov 92 16:56:27 EST Message-ID: \SE A;NATION \SS (WS) \HD Weinberger seeks dismissal of indictment \BY ASSOCIATED PRESS Caspar Weinberger's attorneys are seeking the dismissal of the Oct. 30 Iran-Contra indictment against the former defense secretary. Prosecutors, who were forced to abandon an obstruction charge in June, can't now replace it with a false-statement allegation, Mr. Weinberger's attorneys say. The one-count indictment - which raised new questions about President Bush's role in the Iran-Contra affair just four days before the presidential election - accuses Mr. Weinberger of making false statements to congressional investigators in June 1987 about whether he took notes of key meetings on the arms-for-hostages deals with Iran. The false-statement count replaced a charge of obstruction of Congress in a five-count indictment brought against Mr. Weinberger June 16. Prosecutors had to abandon the obstruction charge because of a court ruling in another Iran-Contra case, that of former National Security Adviser John Poindexter. The false-statement charge is "a totally different statutory offense" from obstruction and cannot stand, Mr. Weinberger's attorneys said in papers filed Friday night in U.S. District Court. Federal law allows prosecutors in certain cases to replace a defective indictment with a new one, even though the five-year statute of limitations - the time limit for filing most federal criminal charges - has passed. But "we have found no reported federal decisions" that permit "filing a new indictment for a time-barred offense, separate and distinct from the one charge in the original indictment," the lawyers said. In the Weinberger case, the statute of limitations was June 17, five years after Mr. Weinberger allegedly lied to Congress. The Oct. 30 indictment - based on Mr. Weinberger's notes of meetings on the Reagan White House's arms sales to Iran - says Mr. Bush attended a Jan. 7, 1986, meeting on the initiative. Mr. Weinberger's notes say President Reagan and his aides discussed trading 4,000 TOW anti-tank missiles for five American hostages, according to the indictment. Mr. Bush has always maintained that he didn't realize the United States was trading arms for hostages until mid-December 1986. Mr. Weinberger faces a Jan. 5 trial on three counts of making false statements and two counts of perjury. Vice President Dan Quayle, among others, blamed the announcement of the new indictment for stopping Mr. Bush's momentum late in the campaign. Republicans, including Senate Minority Leader Bob Dole, have accused independent counsel Lawrence Walsh of timing the indictment for political effect. They also have called for an investigation into the possibility that the Clinton-Gore campaign was given advance notice of the indictment. This article is copyright 1992 The Washington Times. Redistribution to other sites is not permitted except by arrangement with American Cybercasting Corporation. For more information, send-email to usa@AmeriCast.COM