WASHINGTON -- Prosecutors investigating former Sen. John Edwards spent several hours Thursday re-interviewing the man who posed as the father of Edwards' out-of-wedlock baby during the 2008 presidential campaign.
Andrew Young met with the prosecutors in his attorney's Washington office for more than four hours. The Associated Press spotted him leaving the building's underground garage in a vehicle with a North Carolina license plate registered to his wife, Cheri, at their home in Chapel Hill.
The interview is particularly notable because of its timing. Young has already been questioned by a grand jury investigating Edwards in 2009, and the Justice Department is considering whether to move forward with an indictment.
The prosecutors could be interested in taking a closer look at Young to see how he'll hold up as a witness, since his credibility could be problematic.
Young, who was an aide to Edwards' 2008 presidential campaign, initially claimed he was the father of the child and traveled around the country helping keep Edwards' mistress, Rielle Hunter, hidden.
Young has since come out with a book detailing his role in covering up Edwards' paternity of the baby. Young now says he made a mistake in judgment by lying. His book is being turned into a Hollywood film.
Edwards acknowledged in January 2010 that he fathered the girl, Frances Quinn Hunter.
Last year, a North Carolina judge said he was troubled by a series of seemingly conflicting statements that Young made under oath in a lawsuit over a purported sex tape depicting Edwards. Superior Court Judge Abraham Penn Jones considered sending Young to jail for contempt but backed away as Young's attorneys argued that the discrepancies were memory lapses. Young has said he had the sex tape simply to corroborate his story.
Young's attorney, David Geneson, did not return a call for comment on the meeting, and the Justice Department declined to comment.
The investigation centers on the money spent to keep Hunter and Young in hiding. Investigators are looking chiefly at whether money paid to Hunter and Young - from outside political groups and Edwards' political donors - should have been considered campaign donations since the money arguably aided his presidential bid.
Young would be the chief witness, since one donor who gave them money has died and the second is 100 years old.
Haunted by other case
The investigation is being jointly run by the Republican-appointed U.S. attorney in Raleigh and the public integrity section of Justice Department in Washington.
The Justice Department has reason to be cautious in pursuing the case after the public integrity section's last prosecution of a high-profile politician, the late Alaska Republican Sen. Ted Stevens, ended so badly.
A judge overturned Stevens' conviction and ordered a criminal investigation into the prosecutors' conduct after the department admitted its lawyers did not turn over important, exculpatory evidence to the defense team.
Associated Press writer Mike Baker in Raleigh contributed to this report.
