Claiborne told the senate panel he had been "chased" from the bench by ambitious federal agents and that he had been wrongly convicted for willfully filing false income tax returns. "They have been pursuing me like a pack of wolves would pursue a sick caribou. I know what they have done to my family. I know what they have done to my life. I am innocent. I don't feel innocent merely. I am innocent." Although he acknowledged his 1979 and 1980 tax returns under-reported income, he blamed his tax preparers for the "brutal errors" and said he was only guilty of "neglecting my personal affairs terribly."