Politics

Cuomo’s Attorneys Insist He ‘Really Doesn’t Know’ Exec Assistant He’s Accused of Groping

ON THE OFFENSIVE

“There has been no open-minded fact-finding here,” one attorney, Rita Glavin, claimed Friday.

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Attorneys for Gov. Andrew Cuomo tried to paint the picture of a furtive and unfair sexual harassment probe after independent investigators on Tuesday found that the three-term Democrat had sexually harassed at least 11 women and violated state and federal law. “There has been no open-minded fact-finding here,” Cuomo’s counsel, Rita Glavin, said in a briefing Friday with lawyers representing the Office of the Governor. The lawyers complained that they had received neither an advance copy of the AG’s report nor transcripts of the 179 interviews investigators said they oversaw.

Glavin also dismissed allegations made by “Executive Assistant #1,” who filed a criminal complaint against Cuomo with the Albany County Sheriff’s Office on Thursday, claiming he hardly knew the woman who says the governor reached under her blouse and groped her breast. “He is 63 years old. He has spent 40 years in public life, and for him to all of a sudden be accused of a sexual assault of an executive assistant that he really doesn’t know, doesn’t pass muster,” she said. “Without giving him the evidence, that is irresponsible and a new standard for impeachment,” she added.

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