Dnc Fund-Raiser Surrenders To Fbi Charged With Giving, Arranging Illegal Gifts
In a surrender that surprised even some Justice Department officials, former Democratic fund-raiser Yah Lin “Charlie” Trie flew to Washington on Tuesday and quietly gave himself up to FBI agents.
Trie, 49, a longtime friend of President Clinton, was charged last Thursday with giving and arranging illegal political contributions to the Democratic National Committee to buy access to Clinton and other top officials.
“The press, the Senate and the House were all worried we wouldn’t get him,” said prosecutor Chuck LaBella, a supervisor of the Justice Department’s campaign-finance task force. “But we at the task force weren’t worried. I knew we would get him. I knew we had a long arm.”
Trie’s plane arrived at Dulles International Airport at 4:30 p.m. from Paris after prosecutors negotiated a voluntary surrender with his lawyer.
LaBella said there was no agreement about obtaining Trie’s cooperation in the government’s longrunning investigation of fund raising during the 1996 presidential campaign. But another Justice Department official said it was hard to imagine Trie - a major figure in the investigations of the 1996 presidential campaign - returning to the United States voluntarily without a deal.
One official said Trie “had been bouncing around the Macao and Hong Kong areas.” Another official said Trie also had spent time in Indonesia.
LaBella said agents were awaiting Trie’s arrival at Dulles Airport, and his surrender was “very professional, businesslike and pretty quick.”
Trie was taken directly to federal Magistrate Theresa Buchanan in Alexandria, Va. He is expected to appear before U.S. district Judge Paul Friedman in Washington, D.C., Thursday morning. Trie’s lawyer, Reid Weingarten, did not return a telephone call seeking comment.
On Capitol Hill, where Democratic fund-raising practices have been under yearlong congressional investigation, one leading Republican said Trie’s arrest could expand the criminal investigation.
“Hopefully they’ll be able to use Charlie to lead to other people in this campaign-finance scandal,” said Dan Burton, R-Ind., chairman of the House committee investigating campaign financing. “I hope the Justice Department doesn’t stop with Charlie Trie.”
“It’s been a while, but it’s better late than never,” said Sen. Fred Thompson, R-Tenn., chairman of the Senate committee investigating campaign finances. Thompson renewed his call for an independent counsel to investigate the fund-raising practices, complaining the Justice Department has a conflict of interest because Attorney General Janet Reno and Trie are both close to the president.
On Jan. 29, a federal grand jury charged Trie in a 15-count indictment with illegally funneling money to the DNC and with obstructing justice by ordering a secretary to destroy documents subpoenaed by the grand jury and the Senate Governmental Affairs Committee.
Also indicted was Trie’s business associate, Yuan Pei “Antonio” Pan. They were the first people charged in the continuing investigation of campaign fund-raising abuses.
The grand jury said the two men “purchased access to high level government officials in the United States by contributing and soliciting contributions to the Democratic National Committee.”
From June 22, 1994, to Aug. 18, 1996, Trie attended 10 coffees, dinners or lunches with Clinton and four with Vice President Al Gore, according to the indictment. He also took clients or business associates on three White House tours and personally introduced one group, including Chinese arms dealer Wang Jun, to Clinton.
But the money Trie raised was suspicious. The DNC ended up returning $645,000 raised by Trie. The Presidential Legal Expense Trust, set up to raise money for Clinton’s legal bills, returned or rejected another $640,000. The grand jury said much of the money actually came from unidentified foreign contributors or other contributors and that Trie hid the source by routing the money through “straw” contributors.