A federal judge Tuesday rejected Sheldon Silver’s motion to quash various lawsuits by two women accusing former Assemblyman Vito Lopez of sexual harassment, saying they’ve made a legitimate case that the Assembly speaker could have done more to prevent a “culture of sex-based discrimination in Albany.”
“Plaintiffs’ claim that Silver’s action, and inaction, in the face of over a decade of successive complaints of sexual harassment against senior Assembly officials, fostered a culture a sex-based discrimination,” Manhattan federal Judge Analisa Torres.
“It is not implausible therefore that Lopez’s sexual harassment was a foreseeable product of this culture.”
Silver had claimed the case should be dismissed because he took “swift and effective” action by going to the Ethics Committee to review the 2012 allegations after staffers Victoria Burhans and Chloe Rivera complained about Lopez. Silver also alleged he can’t be held liable for a prior harassment complaint against Lopez that resulted in a cash settlement.
Silver’s lawyers did not return a message.
A pre-trial hearing is set for July 2.
A state ethics commission found last year that Lopez had accosted at least eight staffers with incessant come-ons since 2010.