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Former governor sued for sexual harassment
Andrew Cuomo faces a civil suit over allegations made by a former member
of his security detail
August 2, 2021 © Getty Images / Lev Radin
A US state trooper is suing former New York Governor Andrew Cuomo for sexual harassment, according to a lawsuit filed on Thursday. The plaintiff is the first of 11 women alleging misconduct by the governor to bring a civil case against him, after prosecutors declined to press criminal charges last year.
Identified in the lawsuit as ‘Trooper 1’, the woman was plucked from her job as a New York State Trooper in 2017 to serve on Cuomo’s security detail. Once onboard, she claims she was repeatedly harassed and inappropriately touched by the Democrat.
“He commented on her appearance (‘why don’t you wear a dress?’); wanted to kiss her ('[c]an I kiss you?’); asked her to find him a girlfriend who could ‘handle pain;' and steered their conversations towards sex ('[w]hy would you want to get married? . . . your sex drive goes down,’” reads an excerpt from the suit published by Politico.
The suit also accuses Cuomo of inappropriate contact, and claims that the then-governor pressed the trooper into accepting an unwanted kiss, while acknowledging that such behavior was against the rules.
The allegations in the suit are not new. They were first laid out in a report by New York Attorney General Letitia James last August. James’ report found “credible” evidence that Cuomo sexually harassed 11 women, including ‘Trooper 1’, but multiple county prosecutors declined to file charges due to what they said was a lack of evidence of criminal wrongdoing.
‘Trooper 1’ is seeking an undisclosed sum of money from the former governor in the civil suit. Melissa DeRosa, a former aide to Cuomo, and the New York State Police are also accused in the lawsuit of covering up Cuomo’s alleged misdeeds.
Although Cuomo resigned shortly after James’ report was released, he denied any misconduct, and his team accused the AG of orchestrating a political hit. Indeed, James announced a run for governor that October, but withdrew her candidacy several weeks later, and said that she will instead run for reelection as attorney general.
Cuomo’s spokesman, Rich Azzopardi, said on Thursday that the lawsuit is based on James’ “proven fraud of a report,” and said that the trooper’s legal team have been “widely known to use the press to extort settlements on behalf of anonymous claimants.”
Paul Schectman, an attorney for DeRosa, said that the only interactions his client had with the trooper amounted to saying “hello and goodbye,” adding “It is not a viable case anywhere in America and is beyond frivolous.”
French first lady sues over transgender claims
Brigitte Macron is dragging two women to court for publishing
scandalous claims about her online
September 27, 2021 © Getty Images / Chesnot
Brigitte Macron, wife of French President Emmanuel Macron, has sued two women who spread rumors that she underwent a sex change, according to an AFP report on Friday. The case comes as her husband gears up for a tough reelection campaign.
A first hearing in the case has been set for June 15 in Paris, a legal source told AFP. Macron's three children from her previous marriage as well as her brother have also signed on to the suit, the news agency added.
The rumors in question were started early last year by an independent journalist and a self-proclaimed spiritual ‘medium’. A series of posts on Facebook and a video interview between the two women posted to YouTube gained traction, and by December the hashtag #JeanMichelTrogneux was getting national attention. The hashtag is a reference to what the conspiracy theorists believe to be Brigitte Macron’s real maiden name – Jean Michel Trogneux.
According to her biography, Mrs. Macron was born Brigitte Marie-Claude Trogneux.
The journalist in question purportedly told the ‘medium’ that evidence of the first lady’s gender transition is in “a sealed envelope deposited with a lawyer whose name is well known,” and would be made public if France made Covid-19 vaccination compulsory.
Emmanuel Macron has faced questions about his relationship with his wife – who is 24 years his senior and taught at the French president’s high school – before, but the rumors referenced in the lawsuit bear a striking similarity to accusations once leveled against former US First Lady Michelle Obama.
Comedian Joan Rivers stated in 2014 that Mrs. Obama is "a transgender. We all know it,” and some right-wingers still insist that the former first lady was born a man named Michael. Right-wing polemicist Alex Jones claimed in 2017 to have “photos and videos” to prove it.
Jones’ claims were never substantiated, nor were they ever publicly acknowledged by the Obamas.
Mrs. Macron has chosen to confront her accusers in court, a decision that could draw negative publicity to her family ahead of France’s presidential election in April. Emmanuel Macron has not yet officially entered the race, and his approval rating has hovered around 40% for the last year. However, despite opposition on the right from Valerie Pecresse, Marine Le Pen, and anti-establishment firebrand Eric Zemmour, Macron is currently slated to win reelection.
Jean-Luc Brunel, held on suspicion of supplying girls to Epstein,
found hanged in cell
Former model agency boss accused of rape and suspected of trafficking minors
has died in prison
on Epstein's private jet the ‘Lolita Express’. Photograph: Shutterstock
Kim Willsher in Paris
Sat 19 Feb 2022 15.14 GMT
The former boss of a French model agency accused of rape and under investigation on suspicion of supplying underage girls to the late American financier Jeffrey Epstein has been found dead in prison.
The body of Jean-Luc Brunel, 75, was reportedly found hanging in his cell in the early hours of Saturday. The French prosecutors’ office confirmed the report and said an inquiry had been opened into the exact cause of death, but early indications pointed to suicide.
Brunel was arrested in December 2020 at Charles de Gaulle airport before boarding a plane for Dakar in Senegal where he told police he was going on holiday.
He was officially put under investigation on allegations of the alleged rape of a minor and sexual harassment shortly after his arrest, and was put under a second investigation for the rape of a minor in June last year.
Investigators had also questioned Brunel on suspicion of the human trafficking of underage girls for sexual exploitation. He was being held on remand in La Santé prison in Paris.
Several top models had come forward to accuse him of sexual assault and rape, and French police had reportedly interviewed hundreds of potential witnesses. Brunel had denied any wrongdoing or any involvement in illegal activities. He disappeared from public life shortly after Epstein’s death in August 2019. Epstein also hanged himself in his prison cell while awaiting trial.
In the 1990s, Paris-born Brunel was a model talent scout and boss of the prestigious agency Karin Models. After he was banned from the agency in European 1999 following a BBC undercover report on abuse in the fashion industry, he moved to the US and founded MC2 Model Management with funding from Epstein. He is credited with discovering a number of supermodels including Christy Turlington and Milla Jovovich.
He met Ghislaine Maxwell, Epstein’s partner, in the 1980s and she had introduced him to Epstein.
Brunel had been released on bail last November but had been ordered to return to prison after a few days to await trial.
His legal team said in a statement: “His distress was that of a man of 75 years old caught up in a media-legal system that we should be questioning. Jean-Luc Brunel never stopped claiming his innocence and had made many efforts to prove it. His decision [to end his life] was not driven by guilt but by a deep sense of injustice.”
Yes! I believe that! And if you believe it, you might be interested in the tropical island I have for sale off the coast of Labrador.
In 2015, Virginia Roberts Giuffre, who recently accepted an undisclosed sum from Prince Andrew – another Epstein friend – after bringing a civil case against the royal, accused Brunel of supplying girls to Epstein. She said the American financier had bragged to her that he had slept with more than 1,000 “of Brunel’s girls”.
Giuffre, who was abused by Epstein, had claimed she had sex with Prince Andrew on three occasions, the first of which when she was 17 years old. The prince had denied her claims.
Maxwell, 59, is currently in prison in the US, having been convicted of sex trafficking.
French prosecutors said Brunel’s death would put an end to the legal case unless other suspects were put under investigation.
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