PARDON RECIPIENT SAYS HE HAD TIES TO ROGER CLINTON

Insider connections appeared to play a role in many of Bill Clinton's
last-minute pardons, but none of the recipients are known to have had a
tie-in quite like Mitchell C. Wood of Sherwood, Ark.

When he was sentenced to four months in jail for conspiring to distribute
cocaine in 1986, Mr. Wood told the federal judge that he obtained cocaine
from another man who Mr. Clinton pardoned on Jan. 20 -- the former
president's half-brother, Roger Clinton. In an interview Thursday, Mr. Wood
said he received the cocaine for recreational use.

Also Thursday, a House committee opened hearings into Mr. Clinton's
decision to pardon fugitive billionaire Marc Rich in dramatic fashion: Mr.
Rich's former wife asserted the Fifth Amendment to avoid answering
questions about lobbying for the pardon, and the panel released documents
indicating that Mr. Clinton discussed overcoming resistance from White
House lawyers to the pardon with a top Democratic Party fund-raiser.

In the cocaine case, both Mr. Wood and Roger Clinton became entangled in a
probe of cocaine use in Arkansas business circles in the 1980s that
resulted in guilty pleas from more than a dozen individuals. Roger Clinton,
then serving prison time for unrelated drug-dealing charges, gave testimony
in some of those cases.

Why Mr. Wood was pardoned is a mystery. An employee of the Arkansas
Department of Economic Development, he said he applied to the Justice
Department for a pardon without an attorney's help several years ago and he
hasn't "seen Roger in 15 years." Former President Clinton, he added, "would
not have any idea who I was." At least one other figure convicted in the
investigation, George E. "Butch" Locke, also sought a pardon but was
denied. "I thought when Roger got his, I'd probably get mine," said Mr.
Locke, a former Arkansas state senator.

Roger Clinton couldn't be reached, and a spokeswoman for the former
president declined to comment.

Meanwhile, the House Government Reform Committee heard a contentious day of
testimony about the pardon of Mr. Rich and his business partner Pincus
Green. Both Republicans and Democrats denounced the decision as an improper
use of a sacred constitutional power engineered by a former White House
lawyer hired by Mr. Rich, Jack Quinn.

Denise Rich, Mr. Rich's former wife, refused to answer 14 written
questions, telling the panel through a letter from her lawyer that she was
"asserting her privilege under the Fifth Amendment of the United States
Constitution not to be a witness against herself." Ms. Rich has raised and
donated millions of dollars for Democrats since 1993, becoming friendly
with the Clinton family. A lawyer for Ms. Rich told the panel that Ms. Rich
also gave "enormous sums" to Mr. Clinton's presidential library. Though
estranged from her husband, Ms. Rich asked the president to support the
pardon three times.

The committee had asked Ms. Rich whether she had been illegally reimbursed
for political donations and whether she or her family might benefit
financially for supporting the pardon. Lawyers for her have previously
denied she was paid to lobby for the pardon. The committee plans to
subpoena Ms. Rich's bank records and the presidential library's donor lists
and may ask the Justice Department to support granting Ms. Rich immunity to
compel her testimony.

The committee released a Jan. 10 e-mail from a Marc Rich employee to Mr.
Quinn indicating that Mr. Clinton spoke about the Rich pardon with Beth
Dozoretz, the former Democratic Party finance committee chairwoman. The
employee told Mr. Quinn he heard of the conversation from Ms. Rich, who
heard of it from Ms. Dozoretz, a friend. According to the e-mail, Mr.
Clinton told Ms. Dozoretz that he supported the request and was "doing all
possible to turn around the WH counsels."

Former Deputy Attorney General Eric Holder confirmed that he didn't take a
strong stand on the pardon, even in the face of clear indications that
federal prosecutors in New York would oppose it.

Mr. Holder said he told the White House's top lawyer that he was "neutral,
leaning towards" the pardon, but only if foreign-policy benefits could be
reaped by virtue of the fact that Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Barak had
lobbied the president for it. "Knowing everything that I know now, I would
not have recommended to the president that he pardon" Mr. Rich, he said.

Under hostile questioning, Mr. Holder confirmed speaking to Mr. Quinn -- a
close confidant of former Vice President Al Gore -- about becoming attorney
general in a Gore administration. But Mr. Holder denied that desire
influenced his actions.

Meanwhile, Pennsylvania Republican Sen. Arlen Specter asked colleagues to
support a constitutional amendment allowing Congress to overturn pardons.

- -- Alix M. Freedman contributed to this article.