Four more San Diego women came forward Thursday to relate incidents of sexual assault involving Mayor Bob Filner. According to a report by KBPS in San Diego, all four women hold prominent positions in the community and “believe he is unfit for office and should resign immediately.”
Patti Roscoe, a San Diego businesswoman, told KBPS that she recalled an incident from years ago in which Filner “put me in what I guess now is the famous headlock.” The so-called “Filner headlock” is something Irene McCormack Jackson, an ex-aide of the mayor, mentioned when she came out with the similar allegations on Monday.
“I felt fearful, even as well as I knew him, because it was an invasion into my space,” Roscoe said. “And he would come in and try to kiss me on the lips and I’d have to squirm to get away. And just as recently as a few months ago this happened. I turned and he just slobbered down my chin.”
The other three women–Sharon Bernie–Cloward, Veronica “Ronne” Froman, and Joyce Gattas–shared similar stories, all in great detail.
“He stopped me and he got very close to me,” said Froman, recalling an incident when Filner was a congressman and she was the chief operating officer of the city of San Diego. “And he ran his finger up my cheek like this and he whispered to me, ‘Do you have a man in your life?’ I jumped back. I was very, very startled. And I said, ‘Yes, I have a man in my life.’
“And he said, ‘who?’ And I said, ‘Linden Blue.’ He says, ‘Oh, of the Blues Brothers?’ And he says, ‘Maybe we can get together some time and have lunch and he can support me for mayor.’ “I was really rattled, I got in the car with the two guys I was working with and I told them never to leave me alone in a room with Bob Filner again.” The mayor’s office has not commented on these latest allegations. Earlier he said, “There’s a legal process by which all of this will be decided… There will be no other statements.” After a meeting Thursday evening, the San Diego County Democratic Party Central Committee voted 34-6 to ask him to resign.
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