DeMARTINO
He’s accused of being just as sleazy as some of his clients.
High-powered attorney Salvatore Strazzullo, a staple on gossip pages who has represented boldface names and the people who sue them, was hit with a bombshell sexual-harassment suit yesterday.
Former employee Desiree DeMartino, a paralegal, claims Strazzullo once kept her trapped in a conference room, with her 1-year-old son outside, while he pleasured himself for 10 minutes, according to the suit filed in Brooklyn Supreme Court.
“He said to me, ‘Just touch it, just touch it,’ ” DeMartino, 31, told The Post. “I said, ‘That’s disgusting, you’re a filthy animal.’
“He was kind of like laughing,” DeMartino said of the harrowing incident in 2009. “It was very shocking. I was flipping out.”
Strazzullo has appeared in court for hotheaded rapper Foxy Brown, Olympic boxer Sadam Ali and Milana Dravnel, who filed a $25 million defamation suit against boxer Oscar de la Hoya. He has also represented clients suing the NYPD.
After the alleged incident, DeMartino vowed to behave himself from then on, the lawsuit says.
But Strazzullo was back to his randy ways last October when he “forcibly kissed” DeMartino, put his hands down her blouse and grabbed her breasts, the suit claims.
“I told him this was absolutely the last time he would do this to me and that I was going to press sexual-harassment charges,” she said. “He started laughing at me.”
Weeks later, Strazzullo drastically cut her salary and hours, the suit says.
After her husband called to complain, Strazzullo fired her, the suit claims. DeMartino said she kept working despite the alleged abuse because she needed to help support her family.
“I had to do what I had to do to keep a roof over everybody’s head,” she said.
“There is little to add independent of the allegations stated in the complaint, which simply illustrate downright despicable and intolerable behavior,” said DeMartino’s attorneys, Michael Borrelli and Alexander Coleman. Strazzullo declined to comment.
The suit seeks unspecified monetary damages.