Jury Clears Espy Of Charges
For Accepting Illegal Gifts

WASHINGTON — After brief deliberations, a jury here last week cleared former Clinton administration agriculture secretary Mike Espy of 30 charges related to accepting illegal gifts from companies his agency regulated.

Pundits were quick to declare the verdict a blow against the law creating special prosecutors to investigate high-level federal officials, but the "race card" overshadowed that assessment.

Espy is black, as were 11 of the 12 jurors hearing his case. A white attorney conducted Espy's defense maneuvers for most of the history of the case, but it was a black lawyer who argued before the jury itself, and from its opening statements to its closing remarks, the defense openly played the so-called "race card."

Espy was charged with accepting illegal "gifts" amounting to roughly $33,000. The defense never challenged the facts of the case, arguing instead that Espy wasn't aware the favors were illegal.

Numerous witnesses, however, including some loyal to Espy, contradicted that assertion. One fellow Cabinet member recalled a conversation in which Espy openly scoffed at the ethics laws binding executive branch officials, calling them "junk." And one of Espy's assistants testified that he repeatedly asked her to compile a list of agribusiness leaders he could shake down for cash.

Nevertheless, one juror who spoke to reporters after the verdict insisted the case failed because prosecutors didn't explain what Espy had done wrong. Race, she claimed, had nothing to do with it.

Espy faced up to three years in prison.

Ironically, the investigation — criticized by partisan supporters for costing $17 million — has recovered most of its expenses in fines against the companies that supplied Espy with the "gifts" he was acquitted of receiving. Other juries heard those cases, and the losing defendants, for the most part, were white.