biography
| sex:
| male
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| lived:
| (1946– )
|
| biography:
| Lawyer, born in Vernon, Texas, USA. He graduated in 1968 from George Washington University, Washington, DC, and rose rapidly as a Republican lawyer, becoming the youngest-ever judge on the US Court of Appeal in 1983, and solicitor general under President George Bush. He became nationally known as the Independent Prosecutor chosen to investigate the alleged misdeeds of President Clinton, first with reference to the Whitewater scandal, then in relation to Paula Jones and Monica Lewinsky. The ‘Starr Report’ into the latter appeared in the autumn of 1998, and he himself gave evidence before the House judiciary committee set up to consider impeachment. He became a symbol of the cultural tensions within the USA during the late 1990s. To his supporters, he was the dedicated prosecutor pursuing the truth against a president who, Starr believed, had betrayed his trust. Among the defenders of Clinton, Starr was regarded as an out-of-control prosecutor engaged in a political vendetta. These irreconcilable positions reflected the way the Clinton scandals and the resulting impeachment case had polarized American opinion. |
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