Starr Wins Round To See Foster Notes

Whitewater prosecutors won a round Friday in their fight to obtain a lawyer’s notes of his conversation with the late presidential aide Vincent Foster about the White House travel office firings.

A split federal appeals court panel agreed with independent counsel Kenneth W. Starr that the attorney-client privilege protecting such discussions does not always extend beyond the grave.

Starr had appealed a lower court’s refusal to enforce a grand jury’s subpoena for the notes, arguing that because Foster had committed suicide prosecutors were entitled to examine them.

Starr is seeking the notes as part of his investigation to determine whether presidential aides lied about any role Hillary Clinton might have had in the firings of seven White House Travel Office employees in 1993.

Hillary Clinton has denied in sworn statements that she played any role in the firings, an assertion challenged in a memo by former White House administration director David Watkins.