(
)
You know what they say about birds of a feather.
James Capel, a former top aide to Rep. Charles Rangel, ‘fessed up in Manhattan Criminal Court to being a tax cheat yesterday — just like his embattled boss.
Capel, who earned nearly $160,000 running Rangel’s New York office before leaving the job in February, pleaded guilty to one count of failure to file a tax return and two counts of tax fraud, all misdemeanor charges.
He must fork over $42,088 in New York state back taxes and penalties and foot an additional $1,000 fine. He’ll stay out of jail only providing he’s paid up by his sentencing date of July 12.
In taking his plea, Capel admitted to Manhattan Criminal Court Judge Abraham Clott that he failed to file tax returns for the years 2007, 2008 and 2009. The crimes are misdemeanors because Capel was paying some taxes automatically via payroll withholding.
But according to a law-enforcement source, Capel actually hadn’t filed taxes on his congressional salary since 2003, but the statute of limitations prevents authorities from going after those alleged lapses
In all, Capel saved himself a total of $25,000 in mostly municipal taxes, which were not automatically withheld from his paychecks.
And while it’s odd for such small-scale tax frauds to result in criminal prosecutions, Capel had repeatedly balked at resolving the filing lapses, the source said.
Capel hobbled in and out of Manhattan Criminal Court leaning on an orthopedic cane.
“I haven’t worked there since February,” he told The Post before being ordered not to speak by a tall male companion.
Rangel, Capel’s boss, has had his own share of tax and ethical woes.
As first reported by The Post, his transgressions included not paying $10,000 in taxes on his vacation home in the Dominican Republic, using his congressional letterhead to raise money for a center in his name at City College and occupying several apartments in Harlem in violation of rent-control rules.
Rangel, who is expected to seek a 22nd congressional term in November 2012, suffered a humiliating censure for the multiple ethics violations.
The House voted 333-79 last Dec. 2 to censure him, making him the first congressman in 27 years to endure the rebuke by his own colleagues.
It was just the 23rd time the House has resorted to censure in its 222-year history, with most of the cases occurring during the Civil War against members who pledged loyalty to the Confederacy.
An ethics panel last November convicted Rangel on 11 of 12 charges after a two-year investigation found a “pattern” of rule-breaking.
The scandals have not yet taken a political toll on the shameless pol, who at the height of his woes last year won re-election with 80 percent of the vote.
He said he spent more than $2 million on lawyers, who ultimately quit in the midst of his House trial because he ran out of money to pay them.