Everyone can tell you who Chandra Levy is, can you name Scraborough's dead intern?

[burythehatchet]

http://www.americanpolitics.com/20010808Klausutis.html

A Death in the Congressman's Office
Does Anybody in the Press Care About Lori Klausutis?
By Denis Wright and Chris George

August 8, 2001 (APJP)

Once upon a time, the phrase "investigative reporter" actually meant something. It usually involved hard work, possibly even mentation. Now, it seems, they just make stuff up. Especially on the Fox News Channel, where an uninitiated viewer could easily think she/he had tuned in Comedy Central. It's "Chandra-Chandra-Chandra" with the occasional "Condit is just like Clinton" thrown in. Given our media's 24/7 obsession with the Gary Condit "scandal", you might assume that there is a real dearth of hard news to pursue.

.....

"FORT WALTON BEACH, FL. - Lori Klausutis, a 28-year-old office worker for Rep. Joe Scarborough (R-Fl), was found dead in the congressman's district office. Police said preliminary findings from the medical examiner's office showed no foul play or any outward indication of suicide."

.....

Unbelievably, that was it. The story was simply dropped. A young female employee of one of Florida's Congressmen had died unexpectedly in the Congressman's office. There were no witnesses to her death and the cause of death was not apparent. Klausutis' boss, Joe Scarborough had recently resigned from Congress prematurely and unexpectedly, amid rumors about his marital fidelity and soon after a divorce. He had also abruptly resigned as publisher of the Independent Florida Sun, claiming that resigning from Congress and as publisher was necessary to spend more time with his sons.

.....

Three Pivotal Questions
by the Editors

September 1, 2001 (APJP) -- Over at The American Prospect's message board thread concerning this very article, Phoenix Woman has asked a trolling Scarborough "defender" three pivotal questions. We'd love to know the answers ourselves:

1) If Lori's death was just a simple accident, then why did Rep. Scarborough and his spokesman Miguel Serrano feel the need to go to two different local TV stations within three hours of her body's being found and invent a nonexistent history of chronic medical conditions for
her -- in other words, why did they feel the need to lie about Lori's health?

2) Would you trust without question the word of a Medical Examiner who lost his ME license in two separate states (Missouri and Florida) because he LIED about his autopsy work (for instance, saying he had autopsied some brains when he hadn't)?

3) Why should whoever wrote Ms. Klausutis's obituary feel it was appropriate to mention nearly everything about her life -- EXCEPT where she'd been working since 1999?

[fl410]

1. Wasn't certain on spelling of her last name but I did know.

:-)

[burythehatchet]

2. Did you know Scar had resigned just prior to her murder? ..amid rumors of infidelity?

9/11 happened at a fortunate time for Joey

[Dinger]

5. Me Too

scarborough hbad something to do with it, simple, but why? What did she know?

[PDJane]

3. I did know........

And would like to know the answer to those particular questions myself.

[KharmaTrain]

4. You Just Gave Me A Flashback

In Summer 2001 we went to a wedding in Boston...stayed right along the harbor. It was in the middle of the Condit circus. When we checked in we were given gift baskets with our names on it...my daughter's had the name "Chandra" on it (no...that isn't her name...kinda close but not quite)...and we all laughed about it at the time.

BTW...Lori Klautis. Do I win anything?

:rofl:

Cheers...

[jobycom]

6. I think probably Scarborough was just trying the keep the story from blowing up.

I think most of his actions can be explained by him wanting the story to be ignored, so he pulled strings and planted lies to make the death seem less suspicious.

The medical examiner lied at the crime scene, claiming there were no signs of trauma to the body. When he later concluded that she had been killed when her head struck a desk, he was asked why he'd said there were no injuries. He answered that the wound was clearly visible, but he didn't want people playing twenty questions over a dead woman with a head injury in a Congressman's office. In other words, he admitted to lying to cover for a public official. It's impossible to see that as part of what taxpayers pay him for.

Still, I suspect that's the truth behind all the lies. They just didn't want Scarborough to face any questions, given what was happening to Gary Condit at the time.

So, at best, Scarborough helped to cover up and impede an investigation into a death, and pulled strings to be sure the death wasn't ruled a homicide, even if it could have been. At worst... well, use your imagination.

Also, there's the idea that a 5'8" woman could have fainted and fallen hard enough to strike her head on a three foot high desk with enough force to kill her. That seems hard to swallow, and since we know the medical examiner's main goal was to stifle suspicious questions, one has trouble accepting his conclusions.

[zbdent]

7. massive (wo)manhunt in the DC area, with tracking dogs, couldn't find the body

(which was found a year later, after all the hubbub died down and the Dem was ousted from Congress, less than a mile from her apartment, in a park "thoroughly searched")

as opposed to the "blunt trauma" victim found in the office on a Monday ...

Or, for that matter, the guy who flew all the way from Las Vegas Nevada to Pittsburgh PA just to "commit suicide" in a bathroom of Scaife's building (how'd he get the gun on the plane?), and the only investigators allowed access to the scene were Scaife's "security" detail?

[yodermon]

8. iokiyar

[PRETZEL]

9. There were just way too many unanswered questions in this whole story,

and after looking at Joey's bio another somewhat interesting aspect that I didn't know before hand was that he got married to a former Congressional staffer and Jeb Bush connected lady named Susan Waren.

Their marriage was only a couple of months after Lori Klausitus's death.

[Mnemosyne]

10. KnR for more visibility.. I feel sicker every day. n/t

[Gold Metal Flake]

11. Wasn't she pregnant at time of death?

[bluesmail]

12. K&R This definitely needs EXPOSURE. Too late? Maybe, maybe not

I so do not trust him being on the corporate TV. UGH.

[SoCalDem]

13. Lori Klausitis n/t

[Kablooie]

14. Wasn't it JonBenet Ramsey?