Assemblyman Vito Lopez loses post in sex harassment case
Brooklyn Democratic leader Vito Lopez was stripped of his Assembly committee chairmanship and seniority on Friday after the Assembly Committee on Ethics and Guidance found he violated the chamber’s sexual harassment policy.
The bipartisan eight-member committee unanimously found that 71-year-old Williamsburg-Greenpoint Assemblyman created a hostile workplace, including verbal and physical sexual abuse, and that his response to the allegations was “not credible.” Complaints by two staff members included repeated unwelcome comments about their bodies and attire, as well as attempts to kiss and put his hands between the legs of one of them when he required that she travel with him to Atlantic City, N.J., in July.
Assembly Speaker Sheldon Silver said he accepted the findings. In a public censure letter to Lopez on Friday, he said he was removing him immediately as chairman of the Committee on Housing, banning him from any other leadership positions, reducing his staff allocation to freshman levels, requiring him to get supplemental sexual harassment training and prohibiting him from employing any staff under the age 21 or interns.