Charlotte Bennett
Cuomo Lawsuits Cost NY Taxpayers $60 Million…and Counting
By Dan Murphy
Westchester native Charlotte Bennett has settled her lawsuit with the State of New York regarding her former boss, Andrew Cuomo, and sexual harassment allegations that she and 11 young women who used to work for the State under Cuomo’s watch when he was Governor.
Bennett settled for $450,000, with $350,000 going to her attorneys. The cost of the settlement will be paid for by the taxpayers of New York, as are the legal bills for all of the other sexual harassment claims against Cuomo, who is now running for Mayor of New York City. Cuomo’s legal bills in the Bennett matter ran to $9 Million, making one NY taxpayer (Me) wondering why this case was settled years, and millions of dollars ago.
Bennett served as an assistant and health policy adviser to Governor Cuomo from 2019-2020. In 2021, when she came forward with her allegations, after another alleged victim, Lindsey Boylan came forward.
She filed another lawsuit she filed personally against Cuomo, but dropped that suit after Cuomo’s attorneys sought her gynecological records.
Bennett’s attorney Debra Katz said, “Ms. Bennett’s allegations were later supported by findings from the New York Attorney General’s Office and the U.S. Department of Justice,” Ms. Katz said in the statement. “Ms. Bennett is looking forward to moving on with her life.”
But Cuomo spokesman Rich Azzopardi differed sayiing, “The attorney general’s discredited 2021 report about Governor Cuomo was pure politics from beginning to end, all at taxpayer expense, and today’s nuisance settlement proves it.”
Bennett’s personal suit against Cuomo alleged that he subjected her to degrading sexual harassment on the job and accused her of lying when she came forward with the accusations.
Governor Hochul commented through a spokesman, “This settlement was mutually agreed upon by the parties and allows the State to minimize further cost to the taxpayers.” But others blamed Hochul’s adminstration for dragging out the Bennett case.
Erica Vladimer, co-founder of the Sexual Harassment Working Group said, “Hochul spent $2.5 million dragging Charlotte Bennett through court proceedings…this unnecessary prolonging of legal proceedings could have easily been avoided.”
NY Attorney General Letitia James investigated all of the allegations against Cuomo and found all 11 credible. But Cuomo has blamed NYAG James for what he calls the further politicization of the allegations against him.
Two more lawsuits against Cuomo for sexual harassment remain. A female state trooper has also filed suit against Cuomo. She claims that Cuomo touched her inappropriately. The State has spent $8.6 Million on that case already, and the trooper may be Cuomo’s most difficult accusation to ignore.
And a lawsuit by former Cuomo staffer Brittany Commisso, remains.
And five months ago, Cuomo filed a lawsuit against Bennett and Katz for defamation.
Bennett also claims that Cuomo top staffer Melissa DeRosa and others knew about the allegations.
When she was 23 and Cuomo 64, Bennett claimed that Cuomo asked her sexual questions about her love life.
When all of the allegations became public, Cuomo resigned in 2021, primarily for the harassment allegations but also for the nuring home deaths under his watch during COVID.
The COVID-Nursing Home allegations continued to linger against Cuomo.
While we diferentiate the allegations made against Cuomo, (mostly verbal harassment with some touching and grouping), with sexual rape allegations and criminal charges against Harvey Weinstein and P. Diddy, the fact that Governor Cuomo, assuming that he said and did these things to 11 woman is creepy and troubling, and should disqual him from becoming Mayor.
But he is currently leading the democratic field for Mayor, with five other candidates in the mix.
Melissa DeRosa wrote a book and mentioned Charlotte Bennett in it. She writes,
Some believe that DeRosa’s book confirms that “She knew about what Cuomo did to Charlotte Bennett, believed Charlotte Bennett, and continued to cover up what Cuomo did.”
