Associated Press
Monday, May 3, 1999; 12:57 p.m. EDT

ALEXANDRIA, Va. – Prosecutors told a jury today that Julie Hiatt Steele lied to investigators because she wanted to profit from her friend Kathleen Willey's story of an unwanted sexual advance by President Clinton.

Ms. Steele, whose grand jury testimony undermined Mrs. Willey's account of a shattering encounter with Clinton, "betrayed a friend to make money," prosecutor David Barger argued in his opening statement.

Ms. Steele's lawyers countered that out-of-control prosecutors in Independent Counsel Kenneth Starr's office were persecuting the nonpolitical mom from Richmond, Va., because her testimony was helpful to the president.

``Julie Hiatt Steele has committed no crime,'' defense attorney Nancy Luque said. ``She just got in the way of a runaway train.''

Clinton has denied making a sexual advance on Mrs. Willey.

Referring to the president 37 times during his 30-minute opening statement, Barger said Mrs. Willey would take the stand to defend her own credibility, explaining why she wrote flattering letters to Clinton after the alleged incident in 1993.

Barger said Ms. Steele sold photographs of Mrs. Willey and Clinton together to the National Enquirer, Time and CNN for a total of $15,500 and that once she began lying she had to continue to lie consistently ``to cover up.''

Jurors will have to decide which of the two former friends is more believable.

Ms. Steele's lawyer told jurors that prosecutors erred by believing Mrs. Willey's story and granting her immunity from prosecution.

Ms. Steele has repeatedly testified that she first learned of the alleged incident in 1997, when Mrs. Willey called and urged her to lie to a Newsweek reporter to corroborate Mrs. Willey's story. Ms. Steele initially told the reporter that Mrs. Willey had told her about the encounter with Clinton the day it allegedly occurred.

But she later recanted and told investigators Mrs. Willey had told her nothing about a sexual advance until the 1997 telephone call.

Barger said, however, that three witnesses would testify that Ms. Steele had discussed Mrs. Willey's story with them prior to 1997.

Luque dismissed those accounts as stories that witnesses had modified during repeated interviews with Starr's investigators.

A jury and two alternates -- eight women and six men -- were seated in less than an hour this morning.

``We are not going to try Mrs. Willey,'' U.S. District Judge Claude Hilton warned while the jurors were out of the courtroom. ``We are not going to get into the truthfulness of Mrs. Willey's story.''

The case against Ms. Steele, a relatively minor player in Starr's probe, is the only criminal trial resulting from the investigation that centered on the president's relationship with Monica Lewinsky and led to a Senate impeachment trial.

Starr recently suffered a stinging courtroom setback in his case against Susan McDougal, a figure in the Whitewater phase of his investigation, who sat in the courtroom during opening arguments.

Hilton has made clear he will not allow Ms. Steele's lawyers to put Starr's tactics on trial, as happened when Ms. Steele testified in support of Mrs. McDougal, a former Whitewater investment partner of Clinton and his wife, Hillary.

Ms. Steele's lawyer, Luque, argued before Hilton that Starr's prosecutors made a series of misrepresentations, designating Ms. Steele as a mere witness in the investigation when they actually regarded her as a major focus of the probe. Ms. Steele was tricked into making statements for which she was later indicted, her legal team contends.

``Nancy Luque told me that if she sees an opening to put Starr on trial, she'll call Starr as her first witness and Susan McDougal right behind him,'' said Geragos.

The defense has subpoenaed testimony and notes from Newsweek magazine reporter Michael Isikoff, who first wrote about Mrs. Willey's allegation. The defense team also issued a subpoena to CBS for outtakes from a ``60 Minutes'' interview with Mrs. Willey.

Hilton has yet to decide whether to allow that evidence into the case. CBS and Newsweek are seeking to quash the subpoenas.