SUSAN MCDOUGAL ON TRIAL
				The Clinton Scandal Nov. 23, 1998 (Embezzlement Acquittal) Nov. 24 1998 Update March 8, 1999 (Jury Selection - Federal Trial) March 10 Update March 11 Update Discuss the Case March 16 Update March 18 Update March 22 Update March 23 Update March 24 Update March 25 Update March 30 Update April 1 Update April 2 Update April 5 Update (Morning) April 5 Update (Afternoon) April 7 Update (Morning)

LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (Court TV) — The investigation of the Clintons that began with a failed land deal in Arkansas has returned to its roots.

After traversing the scandal-ridden terrain of sexual misconduct, the Clintons' involvement in the failed Whitewater real-estate partnership fifteen years ago is being revisited at Susan McDougal's trial.

McDougal, whose trial began last week, is charged with criminal contempt for refusing to answer prosecutors' questions. Now Independent Counsel Ken Starr's prosecutors are trying to show what significant information they could have learned had she obeyed their subpoena.

On Tuesday, the court watched Hillary Clinton's grand jury testimony about Whitewater. The first public viewing of her testimony came just as Mrs. Clinton is contemplating a run for the U.S. Senate.

In forty minutes of videotaped testimony, Hillary Clinton denied reviewing the records of the Whitewater land deal and said she was not aware that a $27,600 check made out to President Clinton had been used to pay off a Whitewater debt.

She also said she knew nothing about a $5,081 check from McDougal that bore the notation "pay off Clinton". Prosecutors say it was used to pay off part of that $27,600 loan.

"I never spent any significant time at all looking at the books and records of Whitewater," Clinton told Starr deputy Hickman Ewing Jr. "I have never seen these documents before."

U.S. District Court Judge George Howard Jr. ruled that the testimony, taken in 1998, could be shown because defense attorney Mark Geragos had suggested that the prosecutors had never bothered asking the Clintons questions about the loan which they then told McDougal to answer.

Prosecutors said they aren't showing Hillary Clinton's testimony to debate whether or not she was telling the truth but merely to prove that they had indeed asked her about the $27,600 loan.

McDougal claimed she has no information relevant to the Starr investigation and said she refused to answer questions because she believed Starr would distort her answers to suit his own purposes, or charge her with perjury if he disliked her answers.

McDougal's allegation that Starr investigators asked her to lie about the Clintons has put Starr's prosecutors on the defensive and contributed to the expansion of her trial, which now encompasses the larger Starr investigation and the Clintons' Whitewater dealings in the 1980s.

Court TV's Catherine Heins and The Associated Press contributed to this report.

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