NY Attorney General Resigns Amid Accusations Of Physically Abusing Women
In a statement, Schneiderman suggests the allegations are all romantic role-play gone wrong.
New York Attorney General Eric Schneiderman has resigned tonight after a bombshell exposé from the New Yorker reports that four women have accused the New York AG of physically abusing them during the course of their romantic relationships with him.
“It’s been my great honor and privilege to serve as Attorney General for the people of the State of New York. In the last several hours, serious allegations, which I strongly contest, have been made against me. While these allegations are unrelated to my professional conduct or the operations of the office, they will effectively prevent me from leading the office’s work at this critical time. I therefore resign my office, effective at the close of business on May 8, 2018.”
The report, from Jane Mayer and Ronan Farrow — who recently won a Pulitzer for his reporting on Harvey Weinstein — casts a shadow on a lawyer viewed as a committed social justice crusader. Ironically, the report suggests that his involvement in the Weinstein case following Farrow’s reporting inspired these women to come forward.
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The stories reported by the New Yorker are unsettling, perhaps more so because of how well they track Schneiderman’s own earlier statement in his defense:
In a statement, Schneiderman said, “In the privacy of intimate relationships, I have engaged in role-playing and other consensual sexual activity. I have not assaulted anyone. I have never engaged in nonconsensual sex, which is a line I would not cross.”
But the women say his rough role-play wasn’t consensual, but part of a pattern of psychological control that would intensify as Schneiderman drank, something they say he did heavily. His statement, juxtaposed with these stories, suggests a chronic case of miscommunication over what “women really want,” a dangerous road some men travel down that’s usually more fueled by their warped vision of women than anything genuinely happening in their relationship.
Two of his former romantic partners spoke on the record:
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But two of the women, Michelle Manning Barish and Tanya Selvaratnam, have talked to The New Yorker on the record, because they feel that doing so could protect other women. They allege that he repeatedly hit them, often after drinking, frequently in bed and never with their consent. Manning Barish and Selvaratnam categorize the abuse he inflicted on them as “assault.” They did not report their allegations to the police at the time, but both say that they eventually sought medical attention after having been slapped hard across the ear and face, and also choked. Selvaratnam says that Schneiderman warned her he could have her followed and her phones tapped, and both say that he threatened to kill them if they broke up with him. (Schneiderman’s spokesperson said that he “never made any of these threats.”)
Selvaratnam specifically points to the AG’s investigation into Cy Vance’s handling of the Weinstein case in the article, “How can you put a perpetrator in charge of the country’s most important sexual-assault case?”
Another woman, a prominent New York attorney, who declined to be named in the New Yorker report said that she made out with Schneiderman in 2016 and then things took a turn:
Schneiderman hit her so hard, she says, that the blow left a red handprint. “What the fuck did you just do?” she screamed, and started to sob. “I couldn’t believe it,” she recalls. “For a split second, I was scared.” She notes that, in all her years of dating, she has never been in a situation like the one with Schneiderman. “He just really smacked me,” she says.
When she told him that she wanted to leave, she recalls, he started to “freak out,” saying that he’d misjudged her. “You’d really be surprised,” he claimed. “A lot of women like it. They don’t always think they like it, but then they do, and they ask for more.”
Not to dismiss someone’s kink, but the population of women who like getting hit drops dramatically outside of 1940s films and staged porn. It’s far more often a misogynistic trope than anything women actually want — and certainly nothing they need to be taught by an ersatz Christian Grey. And whether or not these allegations are true, mistaking women who aren’t demonstrably repulsed as into something is classically abusive behavior.
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Unsurprisingly, substance abuse also features in the story:
Schneiderman, she recalls, “would almost always drink two bottles of wine in a night, then bring a bottle of Scotch into the bedroom. He would get absolutely plastered five nights out of seven.”
Lawyers fancy themselves hard drinkers, but bringing Scotch into the bedroom is where it becomes vitally important to seek help. Alcohol doesn’t excuse physical abuse, but it can explain it, and the choice to abuse one substance can be wrapped up in the reasons for abusing people.
The stories are harrowing, and coupled with accounts of demeaning and controlling verbal abuse, paint a troubling picture. And now a well-regarded politician is out of a job. Earlier today, we noted that the immediate aftermath of abuse allegations isn’t the time to muse about the man’s future prospects.
Sadly, that will be the thrust of at least one account tomorrow.
Four Women Accuse New York’s Attorney General Of Physical Abuse [New Yorker]
Joe Patrice is an editor at Above the Law and co-host of Thinking Like A Lawyer. Feel free to email any tips, questions, or comments. Follow him on Twitter if you’re interested in law, politics, and a healthy dose of college sports news.
