Pedro Espada, at MLK Event, Compares Self to Martin Luther King

By Roy Edroso in Albany, Crime, Events, Featured

Tuesday, Jan. 19 2010 @ 1:49PM

Yesterday, the Bronx News Network reports, a memorial "Walk for Peace to End Gun and Youth Violence" was held in honor of Martin Luther King in The Bronx; Pedro Espada was there, marching behind a banner that bore the likenesses of Dr. King and himself. The march ended at First Union Baptist Church, where Espada spoke. Alluding to the recent investigation of his health care network by attorney general Andrew Cuomo, Espada told the crowd, "People forget that Martin Luther King, at age 39 [when he died], was not heralded by the press... He was not deemed to be a man of the people. We must recall that as we read our daily papers and study the news of the day."

Give him credit: the man has balls. Bob Kappstatter at the Daily News thinks Espada could get out from under Cuomo's investigation; a colleague suggests Espada's use of his non-profits to enrich his for-profit company is "a shanda, but it's not illegal."

Last Thursday Espada's son was sentenced for muscling video gadfly Rafael Martinez Alequin at a campaign event in 2008: Alejandro Espada, 30, got a conditional discharge and was made to pay for Alequin's video camera, which he broke in the fracas.