SOURCES: STARR'S REPORT ACCUSES CLINTON OF `LIES, LIES, LIES'.

Byline: Don Van Natta Jr. The New York Times

The report sent to Congress by the Whitewater independent counsel, Kenneth Starr, contends that evidence shows President Clinton committed perjury, obstructed justice, tampered with witnesses and abused the power of his office, lawyers familiar with the report said Thursday.

Starr's 445-page report asserts that Clinton lied during his civil deposition in the Paula Jones sexual misconduct lawsuit in January and during his grand jury testimony last month from the White House, three lawyers who insisted on anonymity said.

``The report is a straight narrative'' and it alleges that ``the president continued to lie and lie and lie,'' one source told The Associated Press.

In a 140-page section that outlines possible grounds for impeachment, prosecutors accuse Clinton of abuse of power, one of the impeachment counts leveled against Richard Nixon in 1974. They level an allegation that the president used government resources to attempt to thwart Starr's inquiry for seven months, the lawyers said.

They wrote that the president allowed government lawyers and senior aides to deny repeatedly to the public that Clinton had an inappropriate or improper relationship with Lewinsky, the 25-year-old former White House intern. And, the lawyers said, prosecutors are also critical of the privilege claims filed by government lawyers to attempt to block the grand jury testimony of White House aides and lawyers.

The report to Congress finds no impeachable offenses in the bulk of Starr's 4-year-old inquiry on such matters as the Whitewater land deal or the alleged misuse of FBI files and potential cover-up in the White House travel office. Lawyers say, however, that the report draws parallels between the White House conduct in the Lewinsky inquiry and efforts, they say, that were made in the Whitewater inquiry to cover up what actually happened.

The long-awaited report, which the House of Representatives plans to post on the Internet today, is ``a damaging narrative that reads like a novel,'' one lawyer familiar with its contents said Thursday. ``It accuses the president of lying and obstructing, over and over.''

`No surprises'

But during a meeting with Senate Democrats at the White House, Clinton assured them they would find ``no surprises'' in Starr's report.

David Kendall, the president's lawyer, said Thursday that the report is nothing more than a collection of prosecutors' ``contentions, claims and allegations and we look forward to the chance to rebut them.''

A copy of the report was not made available to The New York Times, but the shape of the report was described in interviews Thursday with three lawyers who said they were familiar with its contents.

The lawyers said the Starr report also pieces together evidence that they say could indicate that the president had obstructed justice, another article in the Watergate case.

The twin pillars of that portion of the report are allegations that Clinton played a role in an attempt by his friend, Vernon Jordan, to find Lewinsky a job in the private sector in December, the lawyers said. The report also lays out a case that the president played an active role in Lewinsky's decision to return several presidential gifts, which had been sought by a subpoena from the Jones lawyers, they said.

Both actions were intended to keep Lewinsky from telling the truth to the Jones lawyers about her sexual relationship with the president, the prosecutors contend.

In his grand jury testimony, Clinton denied that he had sought to help Lewinsky secure a job or retrieve the gifts, his allies have said.

The report also details the fact that Clinton summoned his secretary, Betty Currie, to the White House on Sunday, Jan. 18, the day after Clinton was asked a series of questions about Lewinsky, including private visits she had with Clinton, a lawyer said Thursday.

In February, a White House official dismissed the Currie meeting as an effort by the president to ``refresh his recollection'' about Lewinsky's visits and other matters. The report said Clinton had other motives for summoning Currie on that Sunday in January. It said he asked her a series of questions in an attempt to influence her as a potential witness in the Jones case, the lawyer said.

Prosecutors contend that Clinton also tried to interfere with the Paula Jones sexual misconduct lawsuit against him as early as the summer of 1997, the lawyers said. In May 1997, the Supreme Court ruled, unanimously, that the Jones lawsuit would proceed while Clinton was still in office. Within a week, Jones' lawyers had said they would attempt to interview under oath other women linked to Clinton.

That summer, the report says, Clinton asked Lewinsky to keep their relationship a secret. That request came six months before the former White House intern was subpoenaed to testify in the case, the lawyers said.

Lawyers said he also encouraged Lewinsky to urge her friend and another potential witness, Linda Tripp, to stay silent about a White House volunteer named Kathleen Willey. Willey said she resisted an unwanted sexual advance from the president just outside the Oval Office. At the time, a Newsweek reporter was attempting to interview Tripp, who bumped into Willey shortly after the alleged encounter.

Details about sex

In the 140-page section that lays out the grounds for possible impeachment proceedings, there are several ``salacious and detailed'' references to sexual encounters between Clinton and Lewinsky inside the president's private study near the Oval Office, the lawyers said.

A lawyer who is familiar with Starr's strategy said prosecutors felt they had to include such material in the section of the report that discusses whether Clinton had lied to the grand jury. Clinton denied in his grand jury testimony that he lied about their relationship in his Jones deposition.

On Aug. 17, Clinton testified to the grand jury that he had ``inappropriate intimate physical contact'' with Lewinsky. But he insisted that the contacts did not meet the definition of ``sexual relations'' established in the Jones lawsuit.

Indeed, in his address to the nation that evening, Clinton said his answers in the Jones deposition about Lewinsky were ``legally accurate,'' though he acknowledged they were misleading.

Prosecutors say in the report, however, that Clinton lied before the grand jury when he said his sexual encounters with Lewinsky did not constitute ``sexual relations,'' as defined in the Jones case.

Prosecutors argue that the president's decision not to answer those questions compelled them to have Lewinsky return to the grand jury and answer more detailed questions about the precise nature of her sexual encounters with Clinton, the lawyers said. Many of those graphic details are included in the report, including a discussion of the now-infamous blue dress that Lewinsky turned over to prosecutors, according to lawyers familiar with the reports' contents.

``As uncomfortable as this topic may be, there was an obligation to present it,'' one Starr ally said Thursday.

A three-part definition of ``sexual relations'' was prepared by Jones' lawyers before Clinton's Jan. 17 deposition. But in responding to an objection of Clinton's lawyer, Judge Susan Webber Wright of Federal District Court in Little Rock, Ark., limited the definition from three parts to just Part I:

``For the purposes of this deposition, a person engages in `sexual relations' when the person knowingly engages in or causes contact with the genitalia, anus, groin, breast, inner thigh, or buttocks of any person with an intent to arouse or gratify the sexual desire of any person.''

But when he was asked in the deposition about Lewinsky, Clinton consulted the same definition before he denied that he had had sexual relations with the former White House intern.

Based on the testimony of Lewinsky about what happened during those encounters, prosecutors believe that denial was a lie under oath, the lawyers said Thursday.

In addition, the prosecutors contend there is evidence that the president lied several times in the Jones deposition Jan. 17. They specifically highlight the president's denial that he had been alone with Lewinsky, except on one or two occasions when she handed him documents in the Oval Office.

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