8 August 2021: Cuomo to Face Criminal Investigation by Albany County Sheriff

Sheriff says probe by Cuomo accuser to begin in earnest next week

Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple's comments came following the filing of a criminal complaint by one of the victims of Andrew M. Cuomo's alleged sexual harassment. In this report, he indicates the sheriff's office will be seeking to build a solid, prosecutable case against New York's Governor.

Albany County Sheriff Craig Apple plans to huddle with District Attorney Office David Soares early next week to discuss what the sheriff acknowledged is a “high profile” probe into a complaint filed Thursday by the executive assistant who accused Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo of groping her at the Executive Mansion last year....

“We have discussed it, and we hope to sit down in the upcoming week to come up with a game plan,” Apple told reporters Saturday during a news conference with command staff and investigators behind him. “It’s obviously a very high profile investigation, there’s a lot of information out there, we have a lot of fact-finding to do, we have a lot of interviews to do, and I’m not going to rush into it because of who he is, and I’m not going to delay it because of who he is. We’re going to conduct a very comprehensive investigation, as my investigators and staff always do, and when the data and the facts are compiled, we’ll make a decision at that time.”...

“Listen, the last thing we want to do is continue re-victimize these victims and have them tell the story over and over again. I’ve read the (Attorney General's report) as well. I’ve read the report we took from our victim, and I commend them on their bravery for coming forward, and now it’s time for us to begin our investigation,” he said. We treat victims the same, we investigate the same, this one just has more eyes on it....”

Attorney General Letitia James released a statement after Apple spoke Saturday saying, “we will cooperate fully with the Albany sheriff and turn over all evidence related to this complainant. Similarly, we will cooperate with all law enforcement agencies, as appropriate.”

In a related story, the still anonymous victim who filed the criminal complaint against Cuomo, who also still works in the governor's office, spoke about her complaint:

Cuomo aide who filed groping complaint said governor ‘broke the law’

We opted to feature this story because it references material from two other original sources:

The assistant to Gov. Andrew Cuomo who filed a criminal complaint against him said in an interview to air Monday that “what he did to me was a crime.”

“He broke the law,” the woman told the Albany Times Union and CBS News, speaking for the first time since Attorney General Letitia James released the findings of an independent report Tuesday saying the aide was one of 11 women to have been sexually harassed by Cuomo.

The full interview with the unidentified aide, who has accused the governor of groping her while they took a selfie together, and was called “Executive Assistant #1,” in James’ report, is to air Monday on “CBS This Morning” at 7 a.m.

Something to look forward to on Monday. The timeline's coverage of the interview will be delayed to capture the reactions to the interview.