New York businesswoman says governor Andrew Cuomo forcibly kissed her cheeks in 2017

Sherry Vill, 55, a businesswoman from Greece, New York, said at an online news conference on Monday that she was unexpectedly “manhandled” by the Democrat when he came to survey damage to her home after a nearby lake flooded the area.

Arriving home from work on the afternoon of May 28, 2017, to find the governor at her home with his entourage, Vill said she asked Cuomo if she and her neighbours “had to live like this.”

“That’s when the governor looked at me, approached me to have my hand and pulled me to him,” said Vill, who said the governor leaned down to kiss her as she held her small Yorkshire terrier in her arms.

“I thought he was going to pet my dog, but instead he wedged his face between the dog and mine and kissed me on the other cheek. In what I felt was a highly sexual manner. I wasn’t expecting that at all.”

In a statement, Cuomo’s lawyer Rita Glavin said, “During times of crisis, the governor has frequently sought to comfort New Yorkers with hugs and kisses. As I have said before, the governor has greeted both men and women with hugs, a kiss on the cheek, forehead or hand for the past 40 years.”