WASHINGTON - Mike Espy, President Clinton's first agriculture secretary, was indictedWednesday on federal charges of accepting $35,000 in illegal gifts from favor-seeking cronies and firms that he regulated.
The 39-count indictment also accused Espy of lying to investigators, ordering an Agriculture Department employee to falsify a travel record sought in the investigation and having the government pay for a car that he used for personal travel.
Espy, 43, a former three-term congressman and the first African American to be agriculture secretary, repeatedy has said he did nothing wrong.
In Edgartown, Massachusetts, where Clinton was on vacation, the White House declined comment, saying the Espy case was a judicial matter.
The indictment of Espy culminated a three-year investigation by independent counsel Donald Smaltz, who began looking into reports of improper gift-taking on Sept. 9, 1994.
Smaltz told reporters he hoped a trial for Espy could be held in the fall. He declined to discuss who was a subject of his continuing investigation beyond Tyson Foods Inc, the Arkansas meat processor that allegedly provided $10,000 in gifts and travel to Espy.
In separate statements, Tyson Foods and Espy attorney Reid Weingartern said the indictment contorted common hospitality into criminal behavior. Tyson Foods said it never sought special treatment.
"Never has so much been made of so little," Weingarten said, adding, "we look forward to going to court and restoring Mike Espy's good name."
The indictment said Espy continually "sought, solicited, received and accepted gifts, gratuities and things of value...from corporations seeking official action." He allegedly tried to conceal his actions by misleading investigators, filing a false financial disclosure statement and having records altered so they would not show he was a guest at a football game in Dallas.
So far, the investigation has cost $9 million. Smaltz has won criminal convictions against three corporations, five individuals and one law firm plus $3.5 million in fines. The convictions were related to gifts to Espy and his brother or to win access and influence decisions.
The Clinton administration has been the subject of four independent counsel investigations, including the one by Kenneth Starr, into a host of activities related to Clinton and his wife Hillary.
In addition, Republicans have called for special prosecutors in other cases, including fund raising by Vice President Al Gore.
In the indictment handed up by a federal grand jury Wednesday, Espy also was accused of illegally accepting gifts and travel on 13 occasions. They included luggage, a crystal bowl and tickets to the U.S. Open tennis tournament, two professional basketball games and two football games including the Super Bowl.
The maximum penalty for many of the counts in the indictment was five years in prison. Witness tampering carries a penalty of up to 10 years in prison.
Espy would face a mandatory sentence of one year in jail if convicted on any of three counts that allege he violated the Meat Inspection Act, which traditionally has been used to discipline plant inspectors. A Smaltz spokesman said Espy was the first person accused of breaking that law while serving as agriculture secretary.
Tyson Foods allegedly paid for travel and lodging so that Espy could attend an NFL playoff game in January 1994, a May 1994 birthday party for a Tyson executive and an expensive dinner celebrating Clinton's inaugural in 1993.
Earlier this summer, Tyson Foods said it had been notified that it was a target of the investigation. Retired chairman Don Tyson, a political donor and friend of Clinton, testified before the grand jury during two days in May.
Most of the gifts cited in the indictment came from Tyson Foods or Sun-Diamond Growers of California, a cooperative that was convicted of illegal gratuities to a Cabinet member and fined $1.5 million.
Elected from a poor rural district, Espy was the first black man to represent Mississippi in Congress since the Reconstruction era of the 1860s and 1870s. A surprise choice to head the Agriculture Department, he conducted a campaign to modernize meat inspection. He resigned from the Cabinet in late 1994.
Espy made a rare public appearance in Washington in mid-August, receiving a standing ovation as a speaker at the annual Blacks in Government conference.
He joked about a note from predecessor Edward Madigan about some of the department's top officials -- "I still have that handwritten note. It's probably the only thing the independent counsel didn't subpoena."
In addition to the Espy trial, Smaltz still must handle trials of Richard Douglas, Sun-Diamond lobbyist and longtime Espy friend, and Ron Blackley, Espy's former chief of staff, as well as decide whether to seek charges against Tyson Foods.
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