Former Gov. Andrew Cuomo is suing the New York State Comptroller’s workplace to get taxpayers to pay his authorized payments for yet one more lawsuit Cuomo filed in opposition to the workplace of his political nemesis, State Lawyer Normal Letitia James.
The Workplace of State Comptroller (OSC) has requested the courtroom to dismiss Cuomo’s problem and the events are anticipated to satisfy in courtroom Monday.
If Cuomo have been to prevail it will elevate the state’s authorized price for Cuomo-related scandals above the eye-popping $60 million determine launched by the state controller on March 10.
Cuomo needs the state to cowl the price of his authorized battle to get videotapes and unredacted transcripts of interviews the legal professional basic’s workplace performed whereas investigating the then-governor for sexual harassment.
Cuomo, a Democrat, says he by no means sexually harassed anybody, and that the legal professional basic’s 2021 investigation of the allegations in opposition to him was flawed and political.
The legal professional basic and her fellow investigators performed 179 interviews with accusers, staffers and witnesses. In the end, they discovered the harassment allegations of 11 ladies to be credible.
The previous governor is entitled to a taxpayer funded protection underneath state regulation, however the state comptroller’s workplace mentioned taxpayers weren’t obligated to pay for Cuomo to sue the legal professional basic.
The comptroller’s workplace gained an attraction in February after a decrease courtroom mentioned the payments must be coated.
Cuomo’s little-known lawsuit in opposition to the OSC was filed in July 2024 after payments submitted for reimbursement have been rejected.
Earlier in March, a breakdown launched by the Workplace of State Comptroller Tom DiNapoli discovered the scandals that price Cuomo his job in Albany had already price state taxpayers nearly $60 million in authorized charges.
“The initial disallowed claims for payment were embedded as part of other invoices,” the comptroller’s workplace mentioned, declining to say how a lot cash Cuomo was requesting. “We cannot provide dollar values as we denied those payments and put the firm on notice not to submit any further entries.”
A few of the ladies who say Cuomo sexually harassed them whereas he was governor declare he has used his authorized funds to legally harass them since he stepped down.
“He’s using the taxpayer dime everything he’s doing now to seek retribution and silence us is on your money. this is the exact kind of mayor he will be,” Lindsey Boyland, considered one of Cuomo’s accusers, mentioned in a TV interview.
Cuomo is just not utilizing tax {dollars} for the defamation lawsuit he filed in December in opposition to former worker Charlotte Bennett, who dropped her civil case in opposition to him citing, “abusive filings and invasive subpoenas…meant to humiliate and retaliate.”
“The attorney general spent millions of dollars on a report that is a sham and over the last three years [Cuomo] has defended himself as he has every right to do,” Cuomo legal professional Rita Glavin mentioned on the day he introduced his bid for mayor. “That report has been exposed, we have thousands of texts and videos that the attorney general did not get, did not release to the public, that refute the claims in the report.”
Within the report launched on March 10, the comptroller’s workplace recognized greater than a dozen regulation companies they are saying obtained funds from the state to work on Cuomo-related controversies. A few of the cash — nearly $18 million, in accordance with DiNapoli’s workplace — paid for personal attorneys to defend Cuomo and his prime advisors in civil sexual harassment instances.
Tens of millions extra went to attorneys who represented different state businesses together with the New York State Police, the manager chamber (governor’s workplace) and state well being division involving probes about nursing house deaths and Cuomo’s $5 million e book deal.
One contract that price the state $6.6 million went to the agency Cleary Gottlieb, which Cuomo spokesman Wealthy Azzopardi says helped finance Lawyer Normal James’ investigation into Cuomo — not Cuomo’s protection.
In response to the state comptroller’s workplace, the state to date has spent $9 million defending Cuomo and prime aides in opposition to a swimsuit by Bennett, $256,000 on a case introduced by Brittany Commisso and $8.6 million defending a federal case filed by a plaintiff recognized as “Trooper 1.” Some Courtroom filings within the Trooper 1 case specific considerations that Cuomo’s discovery techniques have been “invasive and aggressive,” together with final December looking for to depose as many as 30 non-parties to the Trooper 1 case as a substitute of the extra typical variety of about 10.
With some instances nonetheless in courtroom and prices anticipated to develop, some have wished DiNapoli to chop off the funds. In a Feb. 11 letter obtained by NBC New York, Susan Lerner of Widespread Trigger and Erica Vladimer of the group Harassment Free New York urged DiNapoli to instantly pause taxpayer spending on Cuomo’s authorized protection, noting the Comptroller’s “fiduciary duty to protect New York’s taxpayers.”
“The lack of sufficient oversight of reimbursements has enabled Mr. Cuomo to perpetuate the harassment of women he was already found to have harassed by multiple investigations, now through the legal system and at taxpayer expense,” Lerner and Vladimer wrote.
In response to the letter, an legal professional for the comptroller’s workplace mentioned the workplace has “denied payments we have found to be improper, exceed approved costs, or not related to the representation” of Cuomo.
The legal professional additionally addressed Lerner and Vladimer’s points concerning Cuomo’s alleged harassment of his accusers, saying the federal choose “polices discovery and possesses robust authority to prevent misuse of the discovery process,” together with sanctions. The legal professional mentioned they have been “unaware of any relevant federal rulings in this regard.”
