Dec. 20, 1999
There are more new questions concerning key Olympic-bid records.
Last week, we first told you about a mysterious two year gap in newly-released Olympic documents.
Now, the fingerpointing has begun.
Olympic Specialist John Daley is tracking this story.
Eleven years of executive committee minutes were released last Friday.
But there's a two year gap of no minutes from that Olympic board, made up of the inner circle of Olympic leadership.
Which raises new questions--a credibility gap if you will.
Do the documents exist?
If so, who has them?
If not, why not?
The Board of Ethics report released in February, which investigated the bribery scandal, essentially blames two former top Olympic leaders: Tom Welch and Dave Johnson.
A stack of documents covers the past 11 years of minutes from the Executive Committee of the Salt Lake Bid and Organizing Committees.
It could help prove their contention that other top leaders were behind the now-notorious vote-influencing scheme.
But there's a key two-year period for which there are NO minutes.
Now, lawyers for Welch and Johnson are demanding some answers.
Johnson's attorney, Max Wheeler, says, "We've put in requests (to the SLOC) for those documents. They haven't said 'yes' or 'no.' I would imagine if they existed they would be produced. It causes me great concern there may be documents I need to defend my client that are no longer in existence."
Tom Schaffer, Welch's attorney agrees, saying, "I hope that if they exist they'd be produced. If they're out there, let's see them because we didn't do anything wrong."
Then-board secretary, SLOC lawyer Jim Jardine, who's job, along with his assistant, was to take minutes--says those records never existed. "We have no record of us ever taking Executive Committee minutes during that period. Neither the board nor management asked us to prepare minutes," he says.
The gap raises questions in part because it's sandwiched between periods during which detailed minutes were taken--both before and after.
Coincidentally, the two-year gap covers the key months in 1991 when Nagano Japan beat out Salt Lake for the 1998 Games, and Salt Lake regrouped and charged ahead to win the 2002 Games.
On Friday, Kelly Flint, lawyer for both the bid and organizing committees, told the Associated Press the two-year gap covers a period of "informal" board meetings.
To that, Max Wheeler, Johnson's attorney, says, "I don't know why minutes regarding informal decision-making processes would not have been kept."
Both Olympic lawyers Kelly Flint and Jim Jardine declined to comment on camera.
However, an SLOC spokesperson released a statement saying SLOC "has made public all Executive Committee meeting minutes in its possession. If Mr. Welch, Mr. Johnson or anyone else has minutes from these meetings in their possession, they should produce them."
