Metro

Feds add new tax fraud charges against ex-Sen. Espada Jr.

Federal prosecutors today unveiled new tax fraud charges against former state Senate Majority Leader Pedro Espada Jr., who is already awaiting trial on charges that he looted his Bronx health clinics of a half-million dollars intended for poor patients.

A Brooklyn federal grand jury charged Espada in a superseding indictment with several tax counts, along with other charges including conspiracy to commit theft, embezzlement, and misapplication of federal funds. Other charges against the Bronx Democrat included wire fraud, conspiracy to defraud the U.S. government and a forfeiture levy.

Federal prosecutors in January telegraphed their intention to charge Espada with these additional counts during a hearing in Brooklyn federal court at which they detailed the mountain of evidence they have collected against the former senator.

The evidence comes from FBI warrant searches at Espada’s health-care firm, Soundview Health Center, and includes “voluminous materials,” including 90 boxes containing “hundreds of thousands of documents” that prosecutors have already made available to defense attorneys, Assistant US Attorney Colleen Kavanaugh said at the hearing.

Prosecutors say they will offer Espada, 56, and his son, Pedro Gautier Espada, 35, plea deals that would require them to admit wrongdoing in exchange for reduced sentences.

Both are already under indictment for allegedly looting the senator’s health clinics to pay for lavish meals, Broadway tickets and a $49,000 down payment on a Bentley.

However, the Espadas’ defense team has insisted that they will not take plea deals and instead intend to take their case to trial.

The long-expected original indictment against Espada and his son came in mid-December, just two weeks before the longtime pol, perhaps most infamous for spearheading a Senate coup in 2009 that paralyzed state government, was due to leave office after losing his September re-election primary.

Over the past two years, The Post has chronicled Espada’s abuse of public office and his nonprofit clinic, from stocking its board with cronies to lying on his tax forms.

In the original indictment, Espada and his son were both charged with five embezzlement counts and one count of conspiracy that netted them at least $500,000 intended to help impoverished clients of their network of clinics.

They each face more than 55 years in prison.

Between 2005 and 2009, Espada and his son used the Soundview Health Center, which received about $1 million a year in federal funds alone, as their personal piggy bank, the indictment charged, echoing The Post’s revelations.

Espada’s son was charged with rigging a Soundview contract bid so his family-owned janitorial company would win it at an inflated price, as The Post first disclosed.