The former state senator’s story is now one of rags to riches to prison — and disgrace. He was sentenced to federal prison for plundering a nonprofit and to pay $368,088 in forfeiture, $368,087.43 in restitution and $118,531 to the IRS. He also has to serve 100 hours of community service.
Comments (24)By John Marzulli / NEW YORK DAILY NEWS
Published: Friday, June 14, 2013, 1:31 PM
Updated: Friday, June 14, 2013, 4:49 PM
Joe Marino/New York Daily News
Pedro Espada Jr. shows his defiance arrives June 14th 2013 for sentencing on corruption charges.
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Pedro Espada Jr.’s
rags to-stolen riches story of a homeless teen, who goes from riding
the subways to serving as one of the most powerful Democrats in the
state senate, came to a crashing end Friday with a judge sentencing him
to five years in federal prison for plundering a nonprofit.
Brooklyn Judge Frederic Block also ordered him to pay $368,088 in forfeiture, $368,087.43 in restitution and $118,531 to the IRS. He also has to serve 100 hours of community service.
The judge credited Espada’s good deeds in the past, but embraced the government’s characterization that he is “arrogant” and used his nonprofit as a “piggy bank.”
RELATED: FEDS ASK FOR 7 YEARS IN SLAMMER FOR DISGRACED EX-SEN. PEDRO ESPADA
Block ordered U.S. Marshals to take Espada into custody immediately, refusing to grant him the courtesy of self-surrendering at a later date.
Grim-faced, Espada touched his lips with two fingers and blew a kiss to his wife Connie before he was escorted through a side door.
“This case showed who Pedro Espada really is,” said Brooklyn U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch. “A thief in a suit.”
RELATED: SON OF EX-STATE SEN. SAYS HIS DAD IS TO BLAME
Espada, 59, was convicted last year of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Soundview Healthcare network he founded in 1981 to serve the poor in the Bronx. He and his son Pedro Gautier later pleaded guilty to tax evasion.
Armed with a corporate American Express credit card, Espada siphoned funds meant for the needy for personal gain, spending thousands of dollars on dinners, spa gift-certificates for his wife, renovations for his Westchester home and parties. Meanwhile, the center lacked X-ray and MRI machines and other medical supplies
.
“Espada spent over $100 on a lobster dinner delivered to his home in Mamaroneck that included an $18 charge to have the shell removed because apparently Espada did not want to endure that burden himself,” Assistant U.S. Attorneys Todd Kaminsky and Carolyn Pokorny wrote in court papers.
RELATED: DISGRACED EX-SEN. PEDRO ESPADA, JR. DEMANDING COURTHOUSE SURVEILLANCE TO PROVE JUDGE PRESSURED JURY
Before the judge handed down his sentence, a defiant Espada told him that the Soundview clinic was the “centerpiece” of his life work.
“What I created as a young man was not a 'piggy bank' but a lifeline that served thousands of people for thirty years,” said the disgraced pol, who was nattily dressed in a navy suit and yellow tie.
He refused to say whether he accepted responsibility for the embezzlement conviction because of his appeal.
RELATED: PEDRO ESPADA JR. LIVING ON LESS THAN $3,000 A MONTH
Block agreed that Espada deserved credit for the medical services his clinic provided to the poor for decades.
He also noted that many of the gifts Espada purchased with stolen monies went to his wife, not a mistress, and mused about how extraordinary it seemed that he didn't have a girlfriend in Albany.
“It doesn't matter if a misappropriated dollar goes to a wife or a girlfriend,” Kaminsky shot back.
RELATED: EX-SEN. PEDRO ESPADA SAYS NEW EVIDENCE PROVES INNOCENCE
Espada had been waging an 11th-hour effort to set aside the verdict and withdraw his guilty plea by accusing the judge of committing misconduct by secretly speaking to the jurors while they were deliberating. Block said he was not even in the courthouse when the two jurors claim he entered the jury room.
Espada then demanded a review of courthouse records to back up his claims.
The strategy backfired — court officials produced computer records of
Block's access swipe card in court on Friday showing beyond any doubt
that he was not in the building when the juror claimed.
RELATED: JUDGE DISPUTES ESPADA'S CLAIM HE PRIVATELY URGED A VERDICT
“I'm glad there's no access card in the men's room,” Block quipped after noting how extensively his comings and goings in the courthouse are electronically tracked.
Block said he was referring the juror Luis Roman’s “false” affidavit to the U.S. Attorney’s office for possible prosecutions of the juror and Espada for obstruction of justice.
Roman attended the sentencing, he told The Daily News, at Connie Espada’s invitation. He appeared shaken that he was now the subject of a criminal investigation.
“I could have been mistaken about the timing. It’s been a year,” Roman said in a turnabout. “Nobody told me to lie.”
Espada is a member of a rogues gallery of state senators recently convicted or indicted on corruption charges that includes Carl Kruger (D-Brooklyn), Shirley Huntley (D-Queens), Malcolm Smith (D-Queens), Hiram Monserrate (D-Queens) and Joseph Bruno (R-Rensselaer).
For the next month, Espada will call home the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn where he will likely be in solitary confinement due to his notoriety. The U.S. Bureau of Prisons will likely send him to a minimum security camp, like Fort Dix, N.J., to serve his sentence with other white-collar and non-violent felons.
“Three’s no merit to his appeal in my opinion,” Block said. “I sat through the trial, the evidence against him was overwhelming.”
Prosecutors had argued that Espada deserved a sentence of seven years while defense lawyer Angel Cruz sought no jail time at all.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who launched the probe as then-state attorney general into Espada's thievery, said justice was served by the sentence.
Brooklyn Judge Frederic Block also ordered him to pay $368,088 in forfeiture, $368,087.43 in restitution and $118,531 to the IRS. He also has to serve 100 hours of community service.
The judge credited Espada’s good deeds in the past, but embraced the government’s characterization that he is “arrogant” and used his nonprofit as a “piggy bank.”
RELATED: FEDS ASK FOR 7 YEARS IN SLAMMER FOR DISGRACED EX-SEN. PEDRO ESPADA
Block ordered U.S. Marshals to take Espada into custody immediately, refusing to grant him the courtesy of self-surrendering at a later date.
Grim-faced, Espada touched his lips with two fingers and blew a kiss to his wife Connie before he was escorted through a side door.
“This case showed who Pedro Espada really is,” said Brooklyn U.S. Attorney Loretta Lynch. “A thief in a suit.”
RELATED: SON OF EX-STATE SEN. SAYS HIS DAD IS TO BLAME
Espada, 59, was convicted last year of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Soundview Healthcare network he founded in 1981 to serve the poor in the Bronx. He and his son Pedro Gautier later pleaded guilty to tax evasion.
Armed with a corporate American Express credit card, Espada siphoned funds meant for the needy for personal gain, spending thousands of dollars on dinners, spa gift-certificates for his wife, renovations for his Westchester home and parties. Meanwhile, the center lacked X-ray and MRI machines and other medical supplies
.“Espada spent over $100 on a lobster dinner delivered to his home in Mamaroneck that included an $18 charge to have the shell removed because apparently Espada did not want to endure that burden himself,” Assistant U.S. Attorneys Todd Kaminsky and Carolyn Pokorny wrote in court papers.
Aaron Showalter/New York Daily News
Former state senator Pedro Espada Jr. arrives June 14, 2013, at Federal Court. He was convicted last year of stealing hundreds of thousands of dollars from the Soundview Healthcare network he founded in 1981.
Before the judge handed down his sentence, a defiant Espada told him that the Soundview clinic was the “centerpiece” of his life work.
“What I created as a young man was not a 'piggy bank' but a lifeline that served thousands of people for thirty years,” said the disgraced pol, who was nattily dressed in a navy suit and yellow tie.
He refused to say whether he accepted responsibility for the embezzlement conviction because of his appeal.
RELATED: PEDRO ESPADA JR. LIVING ON LESS THAN $3,000 A MONTH
Block agreed that Espada deserved credit for the medical services his clinic provided to the poor for decades.
He also noted that many of the gifts Espada purchased with stolen monies went to his wife, not a mistress, and mused about how extraordinary it seemed that he didn't have a girlfriend in Albany.
“It doesn't matter if a misappropriated dollar goes to a wife or a girlfriend,” Kaminsky shot back.
RELATED: EX-SEN. PEDRO ESPADA SAYS NEW EVIDENCE PROVES INNOCENCE
Espada had been waging an 11th-hour effort to set aside the verdict and withdraw his guilty plea by accusing the judge of committing misconduct by secretly speaking to the jurors while they were deliberating. Block said he was not even in the courthouse when the two jurors claim he entered the jury room.
Espada then demanded a review of courthouse records to back up his claims.
Aaron Showalter/New York Daily News
Judge Frederic Block ordered Espada to prison for five years and to pay $368,088 in forfeiture, $368,087.43 in restitution and $118,531 to the IRS. He also has to serve 100 hours of community service.
RELATED: JUDGE DISPUTES ESPADA'S CLAIM HE PRIVATELY URGED A VERDICT
“I'm glad there's no access card in the men's room,” Block quipped after noting how extensively his comings and goings in the courthouse are electronically tracked.
Block said he was referring the juror Luis Roman’s “false” affidavit to the U.S. Attorney’s office for possible prosecutions of the juror and Espada for obstruction of justice.
Roman attended the sentencing, he told The Daily News, at Connie Espada’s invitation. He appeared shaken that he was now the subject of a criminal investigation.
“I could have been mistaken about the timing. It’s been a year,” Roman said in a turnabout. “Nobody told me to lie.”
Espada is a member of a rogues gallery of state senators recently convicted or indicted on corruption charges that includes Carl Kruger (D-Brooklyn), Shirley Huntley (D-Queens), Malcolm Smith (D-Queens), Hiram Monserrate (D-Queens) and Joseph Bruno (R-Rensselaer).
For the next month, Espada will call home the Metropolitan Detention Center in Brooklyn where he will likely be in solitary confinement due to his notoriety. The U.S. Bureau of Prisons will likely send him to a minimum security camp, like Fort Dix, N.J., to serve his sentence with other white-collar and non-violent felons.
“Three’s no merit to his appeal in my opinion,” Block said. “I sat through the trial, the evidence against him was overwhelming.”
Prosecutors had argued that Espada deserved a sentence of seven years while defense lawyer Angel Cruz sought no jail time at all.
Gov. Andrew Cuomo, who launched the probe as then-state attorney general into Espada's thievery, said justice was served by the sentence.
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