2 August 2021: NY DOH Lawyered Up After Cuomo COVID Nursing Home Deaths Coverup Exposed

NY state Health Dept. retains outside counsel for Cuomo COVID-19 probes

Evidence that many more New York state officials and employees than just Andrew M. Cuomo are at risk of legal consequences related to the Cuomo administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive emerged in recent days. Documents obtained by the New York Law Journal through a Freedom of Information Act (FOIA) request for information from the New York Department of Health indicate the agency hired lawyers to defend its actions from federal and New York state criminal investigations.

The state Department of Health is lawyering up amid multiple investigations into Gov. Andrew Cuomo’s alleged mishandling of New York’s nursing homes during the COVID-19 pandemic.

DOH retained lawyers from the firm Fried, Frank, Harris, Shriver & Jacobson with a $1.5 million contract to “[respond] to multiple inquiries related to investigations of the State’s COVID-19 response by law enforcement and other governmental or regulatory bodies,” according to New York Law Journal, which obtained a copy of the Feb. 1 legal agreement through a Freedom of Information request.

According to the contract, DOH has retained lawyers Stephen Juris and Joshua Roth to represent it in inquiries from state Attorney General Letitia James, the US Attorney in the Eastern District and the Manhattan district attorney.

An investigation into the Cuomo administration’s COVID-19 policies by Manhattan DA Cy Vance’s team had not been previously reported. Vance’s office did not return a request for comment....

A DOH spokeswoman told The Post on Sunday that her agency “does not comment on active investigative matters.”

The involvement of the Manhattan DA's office in conducting a criminal investigation of the Cuomo administration has not previously been reported.

The action of New York DOH officials to put lawyers on contract to represent themselves came within three business days of New York State Attorney General Letitia "Tish" James' 28 January 2021 blockbuster report confirming the Cuomo administration was hiding the full extent of COVID deaths among New York nursing home residents.

The Cuomo administration's deadly 25 March 2020 directive, which forced nursing homes to blindly admit COVID patients being dumped out of hospitals to free up hospital bed space from 25 March 2020 through 10 May 2020 claimed the lives of an estimated 1,000 or more nursing home residents than would have occurred had Andrew M. Cuomo and top administration officials not panicked into implementing the deadly directive.