Excerpts from the taped conversations of phone calls on June 6 and 7, 1994, between Rep. Mel Reynolds (D-IL) and former campaign worker Beverly Heard, age 16, as reported in the Chicago Tribune. The first call begins with Heard telling Reynolds she can't make a rendezvous because she is baby-sitting and the children's mother hasn't returned home. In fact, Heard is sitting in the Cook County state's attorney's office during the conversation.

Reynolds:

What you gonna wear?

Heard:

Well, my peach underwear, like you told me to. I was hoping that we could do something really special but I see that's not gonna happen, I guess.

Reynolds:

I was definitely gonna (slang for intercourse).

Heard:

Really?

Reynolds:

Right in my office. I was gonna masturbate too.

Heard:

Really?

Reynolds:

I was looking forward to it.

Heard:

Yeah, I been thinking about a lot [of] times we had together. We had some really good times.

Reynolds:

Uh-huh, that summer when I used to (vulgarity for intercourse) you out south in that Riverdale apartment.

Heard:

Right, right. Remember that one, when I wore white lace underwear. I think it was like the summer of '92 over in the apartment—

Reynolds:

Uh-huh.

. . .

Reynolds:

I want you to do me a favor, all right?

Heard:

What's that?

Reynolds:

I want you to, I want to you—first of all, I want you to think about sex.

Heard:

Yes.

Reynolds:

And I want you to think long and hard. I want you to tell me about a sex thing you did, that I don't know about.

Heard:

Oh, let me see.

Reynolds:

Like when you (performed oral sex) or something, but it was a time that I wasn't there for it.

Heard:

Oh, so you don't want to talk about any of our stuff, you want me to talk about something that you don't know about?

Reynolds:

Right, a sex thing you did with some person, either a woman or some guy or something. And—cause I want to—cause I'd like to think about you in those little panties that I used to (vulgarity for intercourse) you.

(Prompted by Reynolds, Heard graphically describes her first and most recent sexual encounters with her lesbian lover. Reynolds asks if Heard's lover is willing to do a "threesome," and Heard says she has never expressed such an interest. But Heard says another girl, "Theresa," who is 15 years old, might be interested. There is no such person.)

Reynolds:

She's only 15?

Heard:

Yeah, she's only 15, that's it.

Reynolds:

You sure?

Heard:

Uh-huh, I know how old she is.

(Reynolds asks what specific sex acts Heard thinks Theresa would be willing to perform and if Theresa will watch him while the two of them have sex.)

Reynolds:

Why don't you try to set it up?

Heard:

Yes, I will.

Reynolds:

Now you—you're just telling me that, aren't you?

Heard:

Uh-uh. I'm serious.

Reynolds:

You are? You think she's going to like this (slang for penis)?

Heard:

Yeah, I believe she would.

Reynolds:

Yeah?

Heard:

Yeah ...

Reynolds:

What you gonna say to her?

(Heard and Reynolds discuss which details of their relationship will be shared with Theresa.)

Heard:

I'm gonna tell her that I used to go with you when I was 16.

Reynolds:

Right.

Heard:

Yeah, and that, you know, we've been lovers, we were lovers then, and we been, you know, I've been with you and—

Reynolds:

You may not want to tell her that, that age thing.

(Reynolds asks where Theresa goes to school.)

Heard:

I think it's Our Lady of Peace, something like that.

Reynolds:

Lady of Peace? A Catholic school!

Heard:

Huh? Yes.

Reynolds:

Jesus, a Catholic—

Heard:

A Catholic school girl, right?

Reynolds:

Did I win the Lotto?

Heard:

Yes.

[Ed.: Just before leaving office, President Clinton pardoned Reynolds for his various federal charges of bank fraud, wire fraud, filing false statements to the Federal Election Commission, threatening a witness, perjury, and obstruction of justice. (Reynolds served a concurrent sentence for soliciting the underage girl.) Soon afterwards, Reynolds was hired for a position in Jesse Jackson's Rainbow/PUSH Coalition, marking a first in American history: an ex-Congressman who had sex with a subordinate, winning clemency from a President who had sex with a subordinate, being hired by a clergyman who had sex with a subordinate.]

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