Paterson: I Was Source in Times Story About Me

(March 18) -- When The New York Times reported that New York Gov. David Paterson intervened in a domestic abuse case involving his top aide, Paterson said the story was based on unsourced claims and unnamed sources. Now, the governor says, he was one of those sources.

Paterson told a New York radio station today that he was the source who led the Times to write the story that prompted him to drop his election bid and triggered the resignation of five of his staffers amid calls that he do the same. The Times flatly denies the claim.

In an interview with WOR Radio's John Gambling, Paterson said he contacted the Times about a telephone conversation he had with Sherr-una Booker on Feb 7. That was the night before she was scheduled to appear in family court to seek a protective order against Paterson's top aide, David Johnson, who allegedly beat Booker on Halloween. The case was dropped after Booker failed to show up at the hearing the next day.

"I don't want to go into it, but the person who informed others that there was such a conversation was me," Paterson said of his talk with Booker.

A surprised Gambling asked, "You informed the news?" The governor said, "Correct. That's all I'm going to say about it. And it's not my surmise. It's an actual fact. ... The individual who first made it clear that there had been a conversation was myself."

The Times denies Paterson's claim that he was the one who approached the paper about his conversation with Booker. According to the Times report, Paterson told her: "If you need me, I'm here for you."

Booker told the Times that state police, who had no jurisdiction over the domestic case, came to her house and urged her not to press charges against Johnson.

At the Times Web site today, reporter Danny Hakim, an author of the story that broke the news of Paterson's involvement, said the governor's claim that he approached the paper is "not accurate." Hakim said the paper only heard from Paterson after contacting him first.

The Times wrote that it found out that Paterson had had a conversation with Booker during the first week of February and contacted the governor's office before it published the story on Feb. 24. The paper also reported that it sent Paterson's then-communications director, Peter Kauffmann, an e-mail asking why the governor called Booker before her court date.

The Times said only then did it hear from Paterson's office, which clarified that the conversation took place Feb. 7, the eve of Booker's scheduled court appearance.

New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo, who was initially tapped by Paterson to lead an investigation into his office's handling of the case, turned the probe over to an independent counsel and former judge, Judith S. Kaye, last week.