Media gets a smirk from jerk
Vance Jr.
“To me, that is the best path forward,” said Cuomo at a Brooklyn news conference. “I don’t even want the whiff of a perception of a conflict of interest or impropriety.”
Cuomo cited the ongoing investigation by the AG’s office into Vance’s handling of a 2015 case where accused serial predator Harvey Weinstein allegedly groped an Italian actress.
Though the NYPD pushed for charges, Vance’s office opted to drop the probe.
On Tuesday night, Cuomo named Nassau County DA Madeline Singas as a special prosecutor in the Schneiderman investigation.
Vance and his prosecutors, who had launched their own probe with the NYPD, now found themselves on the sidelines as the possible prosecution Schneiderman moves forward.
Suffolk County DA Timothy Sini is separately investigating Schneiderman over an alleged slapping incident that happened on the prosecutor’s Long Island turf. Cuomo, noting Schneiderman’s accusers claimed they were slapped, choked, verbally abused and threatened, said the need for an investigatory clean slate was paramount.
“It’s essential that they know they’re going to have an unbiased, objective finder of fact,” said Cuomo. “And they’re not going to be intimidated and there’s not collusion.”
Vance fired back that any conflict of interest was manufactured by the governor and his decision to politicize the case. of
The Manhattan prosecutor, in a Tuesday letter, asserted there was no longer a conflict because Schneiderman was gone. Cuomo’s lawyer Alphonse David ridiculed that notion in a Wednesday response.
“Your original actions and ommissions in the Harvey Weinstein matter cause the distrust of women’s organizations,” wrote David. “That distrust is your creation, not ours.”
One of Schneiderman’s neighbors enjoyed a laugh at his expense Wednesday, sending a message via paper airplane to the press corps. “If you want me to come down, first send a large pepperoni pizza and a 6 pack of Heineken to Apt 7G,” the letter read once it wafted to earth. “Then, maybe I’ll come down.” The note was signed “E.” Schneiderman took over the job in January 2011, and was running for reelection this November when the bombshell allegations forced his resignation in a matter of mere hours. ERIC SCHNEIDERMAN’S ex-staffers had no clue about his impending demise until he was already gone. If the charges around the disgraced former attorney general just involved drugs or booze, the whole thing would sound more believable to his old colleagues. But detailed accounts of his violent, misogynist behavior left one-time co-workers shocked. “Beating up a woman in bed doesn’t square with the person I spent time with, not the public figure, the person,” one former staffer told the Daily News. “I never imagined this. Not in a million years.” A second former Schneiderman worker said, “If you told me he was womanizing, fine . . .. But nothing like this.” Schneiderman’s hard-drinking was well-known in the office, where he had a penchant for appearing at 11 a.m. with bloodshot eyes and shaky hands, according to a third staffer. “The classic signs of a hangover,” the person said.