Backstage at the Pardon: Tensions and Tipoffs

By Adam Zagorin/Washington

It was Friday, Jan. 19, 2001, the day before the end of the Clinton Administration. ARTHUR LEVITT, chairman of the Securities and Exchange Commission, was sitting in his Washington office. "I got a call from a very senior White House official," Levitt told TIME, "to ask what I knew about PINKY GREEN and MARC RICH." After touching base with his enforcement team, Levitt spoke again with the White House. He reported that the SEC had no jurisdiction over the pair because their business was commodities, not securities. Then Levitt says he took it upon himself to express a view about the proposed pardon. "I said I personally felt this was very wrong," Levitt told TIME. He says the White House official agreed completely. Word of the doubts got around fast--maybe a little too fast. Later that day, Rich's New York lawyer, ROBERT FINK, sent a worried e-mail to fellow members of the Rich legal team, an e-mail that became public at last week's congressional hearing. Fink's warning: "[JACK QUINN] said that the SEC knows of the request and for some reason opposed it." Leave it to Quinn, a former White House counsel who personally lobbied Clinton for the pardon, to jump on a hot tip that might help his client at the last minute.

--By Adam Zagorin/Washington