Background of The Case
On May 6, 1994, former Arkansas state employee Paula Jones filed a sexual harassment suit against U.S. President Bill Clinton and former Arkansas State Police Officer Danny Ferguson. She claimed that on May 8, 1991, Clinton, then Governor of Arkansas, crudely propositioned her. She stated that David Brock claimed an Arkansas state employee named "Paula" had offered to be Clinton's mistress. Ferguson had escorted Jones to Clinton's hotel room, stood guard, and claimed that Jones said that she would not mind being Clinton's mistress.
The suit, Jones v. Clinton, was filed in the U.S. District Court for the Eastern District of Arkansas. Judge Susan Webber Wright, who had taken a class under then-Professor Clinton at the University of Arkansas School of Law, ruled that a sitting President could not be sued and deferred the case until the conclusion of his term (although she allowed the pre-trial discovery phase of the case to proceed without delay in order to start the trial as soon as Clinton left office).
Both parties appealed to the United States Court of Appeals for the Eighth Circuit, which ruled in favor of Jones, finding that "the President, like all other government officials, is subject to the same laws that apply to all other members of our society."
Clinton then appealed to the U.S. Supreme Court, filing a petition for writ of certiorari.
Read more about this topic: Clinton V. Jones
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