Other Cabinet Probes

WASHINGTON — Former Agriculture Secretary Mike Espy, indicted Wednesday, is one of several former or current Clinton administration figures who have been investigated by federal prosecutors. The others:

* Webster L. Hubbell--The former associate attorney general pleaded guilty in 1994 to charges arising from the Whitewater case that he had defrauded his clients and law partners in his former Little Rock, Ark., law firm. He served 18 months in federal prison for tax evasion and mail fraud.

* Henry G. Cisneros--The former secretary of Housing and Urban Development is under investigation by another independent counsel for allegedly giving false statements to FBI agents about payments he made to a former mistress. The statements came as he was being cleared for nomination as HUD secretary.

* Federico Pena--The Justice Department announced in March 1995 that a preliminary investigation of the then-Transportation secretary had found no violation of federal law. The review was opened after The Times reported that Pena’s former investment firm had won a contract to manage money for the Los Angeles transit authority’s pension fund within weeks of his taking office in early 1993. Pena now is Energy secretary.

* Hazel O’Leary--The Justice Department has said it will look into allegations by Taiwanese businessman Johnny Chien Chuen Chung of Torrance that an aide to O’Leary, then Energy secretary, obtained his contribution of $25,000 to Africare, O’Leary’s favorite charity, in return for having the secretary pose for pictures with a business delegation Chung headed.

* Ronald H. Brown--An independent counsel was looking into Brown’s financial affairs at the time the then-Commerce secretary was killed in a plane crash in Bosnia last year. Prosecutors subsequently dropped their investigation into whether Brown broke any laws in his private financial dealings or in public reports of these transactions.