A key adviser to former Gov. Eliot Spitzer during the Dirty Tricks Scandal has resigned as Gov. Paterson’s $178,000-a-year first deputy secretary, the governor announced yesterday.

Sean Patrick Maloney had held the same post with Spitzer but was also given the highly unusual title of “special counsel” in August 2007, allowing him to invoke attorney-client privilege to avoid testifying to investigators probing the scandal in which the then-governor used the State Police in an effort to damage then-Senate Majority Leader Joseph Bruno, his leading Republican foe.

Maloney was never charged in connection with the scandal, although four other top Spitzer aides were accused by the Public Integrity Commission of violating state law.

The Albany district attorney released a report in March, just after Spitzer resigned, that concluded the then-governor had repeatedly lied about his involvement in the anti-Bruno plot.

Maloney unsuccessfully sought the Democratic nomination for attorney general in 2006.

While Paterson expressed “regret” at Maloney’s departure and called him “a trusted adviser and friend,” the governor had told associates in recent weeks that he had lost confidence in Maloney.

Source: NY Post