In an article by Gary Harmon published on the front page of its September 15 edition, The Daily Sentinel of Grand Junction asserted that the illness suffered by “Democrat fundraiser Norman Hsu” on an Amtrak train following his flight from a California bail hearing made Hsu “the latest person who raised money for Bill or Hillary Clinton to come to harm under mysterious circumstances.” The Daily Sentinel article -- headlined “Clinton ties ominous for jailed fundraiser Hsu, Web site says” -- suggested that Hsu was part of a pattern of mysteriously harmed Clinton associates despite including evidence later in the article that no such pattern exists.

Hsu was arrested at St. Mary's Hospital in Grand Junction after being removed September 6 from a Chicago-bound Amtrak train, and one witness told National Public Radio that, in NPR's words, “train workers found a bottle of prescription drugs and pills scattered around his cabin.”

The Daily Sentinel reported that "[a] Web site dubbed The Clinton Body Count has tracked the fates of Clinton confidantes and fundraisers going back to 1992, beginning with C. Victor Raiser II and his son, Montgomery Raser, who died July 30, 1992, in a plane crash." A search of the Internet turns up numerous websites focused on the topic.

From the Daily Sentinel article:

Democrat fundraiser Norman Hsu is the latest person who raised money for Bill or Hillary Clinton to come to harm under mysterious circumstances.

Hsu, 56, was on the run from sentencing in California on a 1991 fraud case when he became ill on an Amtrak train and was taken from the train to St. Mary's Hospital.

He remains in the Mesa County Jail on $5 million bond pending extradition to California.

Sen. Hillary Clinton, D-N.Y., returned $850,000 in contributions bundled together by Hsu, who has been tied to $2 million in contributions to Democrats.

A Web site dubbed The Clinton Body Count has tracked the fates of Clinton confidantes and fundraisers going back to 1992, beginning with C. Victor Raiser II and his son, Montgomery Raser, who died July 30, 1992, in a plane crash.

The Daily Sentinel then observed that "[c]ritics have dismissed The Clinton Body Count as overheated Clinton hatred by right-wing opponents" and noted that the website Urban Legends Reference Pages (www.Snopes.com) has published “corrections” of inaccuracies in the Clinton Body Count list. The Daily Sentinel provided several examples in which Snopes.com had debunked claims and insinuations made in the Clinton Body Count list. The Daily Sentinel did not explain why, despite providing this evidence, it asserted in the article's first sentence that “Hsu is the latest person who raised money for Bill or Hillary Clinton to come to harm under mysterious circumstances.”

From the article:

Another Web site, Snopes.com, lists many of the people on the list with corrections and additions.

Victor Raser, for instance, was national finance co-chairman of the Clinton for President Campaign when he, his son, Montgomery, and five others died in a private-plane crash in Alaska, en route to a fishing expedition, according to the Body Count site.

Snopes cited the National Transportation Board finding that the plane crash happened after the pilot of the small plane tried to negotiate mountainous terrain in low visibility.

Paul Tully, 48, Democratic National Committee political director, was found dead in a Little Rock, Ark., motel room from “unknown causes” and no autopsy was allowed, the Body Count site said.

There was an autopsy, according to Snopes, which found that Tully, an overweight smoker and heavy drinker, died after suffering a massive heart attack.

One death that still reverberates is that of fundraiser Ed Willey, a real estate attorney, who died Nov. 30, 1993, of a shotgun blast to the head. His body was found in deep woods in Virginia, and the death was ruled a suicide, but no note was found, the site said.

Willey died on the same day his wife said she was sexually assaulted in the White House by Bill Clinton, the site said. Kathleen Willey has claimed this month that a manuscript of her autobiography was stolen by the Clintons.

Ed Willey, said Snopes, had stolen $275,000 from a client and was deeply in debt to the IRS. Kathleen Willey, Snopes said, has never claimed the Clintons had a hand in Ed Willey's death.

Hershell Friday, an attorney and Clinton fundraiser, died March 1, 1994, when his plane exploded from an unknown cause, according to the Body Count site.

His name, said Snopes, was Herschel, and the 73-year-old was trying to land his airplane at dusk in a drizzle on an unlighted landing strip when he crashed.

In a part of the Snopes piece the Daily Sentinel did not cite, the website called the insinuation that the Clintons were involved in the deaths listed on the Clinton Body Count “claptrap” and noted that "[s]ince 1994, various respected news outlets have been confronted with versions of the 'Clinton Body Count' list, run their own investigations of a few of the claims, and found nothing to substantiate what they looked into."

The Rocky Mountain News noted as long ago as August 12, 1994, (accessed through the Nexis database), that an early “body count” list, which former Rep. William Dannemeyer (R-CA) circulated to congressional leaders, was one of several charges leveled against the Clintons that were “characterized by serious deficiencies in corroborating evidence.” In a January 4, 1999, New York Daily News column (accessed through Nexis), Lars-Erik Nelson called the Clinton Body Count “one of the wackiest examples of the conspiracy theories that pass for news on the Internet and talk radio,” and added, “It is ignored by the mainstream media as too nutty for serious comment.”

Moreover, despite suggesting in the first sentence that Hsu's illness was part of a pattern of Clinton associates suffering harm under “mysterious circumstances,” the Daily Sentinel did not acknowledge until the 18th paragraph of the article that Hsu reportedly sent what “have been claimed to be suicide notes” prior to his illness. Later, the Daily Sentinel quoted Mesa County District Attorney Pete Hautzinger -- who, according to the Daily Sentinel, says he has seen one of the notes -- as stating, “It didn't make a specific threat, but made clear that he intended to do himself harm”:

Hsu, who appeared as a major Hillary Clinton fundraiser about 2003 in New York, sent have been claimed to be suicide notes by FedEx to several locations.

His case wasn't addressed by Snopes.

Mesa County District Attorney Pete Hautzinger said Thursday he had seen one of the notes.

“It didn't make a specific threat, but made clear that he intended to do himself harm,” Hautzinger said.

Harmon's article was criticized by the Junction Daily Blog.

A tip from reader R.D. contributed to this item. Thanks, and keep them coming.