30 October 2021: Cuomo Albany County Sex Crime Probe Handled Like Ordinary Case

Cuomo criminal complaint was fallout of separate investigations

This report draws more directly and deeply upon the Albany Times-Union's contacts within Albany County's prosecutors office and sheriff's office than the Associated Press report that first reported the filing of criminal "forcible touching" misdemeanor charges against Andrew M. Cuomo. It indicates Cuomo's case was handled more like an ordinary case rather than one involving a celebrity or powerful politician would have been:

The unexpected filing of a criminal complaint against former Gov. Andrew M. Cuomo on Thursday came after the Albany County Sheriff's Office and the office of Albany County District Attorney David Soares have been conducting separate investigations of a woman's allegations that Cuomo groped her during a work-related encounter at the Executive Mansion last year.

Both agencies had interviewed the alleged victim, Brittany Commisso, but the district attorney's case has been part of a secret grand jury investigation; the sheriff's department had used court-authorized search warrants to gather evidence, including electronic records they said supported the woman's account of her Dec. 7 visit to the mansion.

The parallel investigations collided this week when a sheriff's investigator who had been gathering evidence since Commisso filed a complaint with the sheriff's office in August went to City Court and filed her own affidavit in support of a summons that was subsequently issued charging Cuomo with misdemeanor forcible touching.

The summons, authorized by a City Court judge, was issued within minutes, and a day before members of the sheriff's and district attorney's offices were scheduled to meet to evaluate the progress of their respective investigations and decide how to move forward, according to multiple people familiar with the matter.

That meeting was canceled after the summons was issued.

Soares and Brian D. Premo, Commisso's attorney, issued separate statements on Thursday saying they had been unaware that a criminal complaint was going to be filed. Although police agencies often file such complaints — especially those involving misdemeanor charges — without consulting prosecutors, several attorneys interviewed by the Times Union said it was not the normal procedure for such a high-profile case.

That last bit is a positive sign, in that it suggests Albany County's investigators were treating the probe like a regular case involving non-celebrity or politically influential individuals. Despite that, other reports indicate Andrew M. Cuomo can expect to benefit from preferential treatment.

In addition to describing the kind of evidence collected to support the filing of the criminal misdemeanor complaint against Andrew M. Cuomo, the report provides a window on how the Albany County officials are interacting with the state attorney general's office and the New York Assembly's investigators assembling the findings from their impeachment probe:

On Friday, Apple said that he has never spoken directly to the attorney general about the case, only to her staff. He confirmed that his office has also compared evidence with Davis Polk, the law firm conducting the Assembly's investigation of Cuomo.

Apple said that before contacting the Assembly's investigators from that law firm, he consulted with attorneys who informed him it was not improper for the sheriff's department and attorneys with David Polk to share notes.

That last bit confirms the Albany County investigation has largely been independent of the state attorney general's investigation. That independence weakens one of the long running arguments Cuomo's personal attorney Rita Glavin has been pursuing, in which she's alleged without evidence that the state attorney general's report was produced to harm Andrew M. Cuomo's re-election prospects while burnishing Letitia James' credentials ahead of her just announced run for governor.