Roy Moore's former colleague says it was "common knowledge" he dated teens
A former prosecutor who once worked alongside embattled Alabama GOP Senate candidate Roy Moore in the early 1980s told CNN it was "common knowledge" at the time that Moore dated high school girls.
"It was common knowledge that Roy dated high school girls, everyone we knew thought it was weird," former deputy district attorney Teresa Jones told CNN in comments aired Saturday. "We wondered why someone his age would hang out at high school football games and the mall ... but you really wouldn't say anything to someone like that."
CBS News has reached out to Jones for comment.
Jones, now a partner at the Syprett, Meshad, Resnick, Lieb, Dumbaugh, Jones, Krotec & Westheimer, P.A. law firm based in Sarasota, Florida, served as deputy district attorney for Etowah County, Alabama from 1982 to 1985, according to her firm's website. Moore worked as a deputy district attorney in that office from 1977 to 1982. Before joining the DA's office, Jones was the assistant city attorney for the city of Gadsden, Alabama, the county seat of Etowah County.
Jones' comments come after an explosive Washington Post report in which four women say Moore pursued them sexually or romantically when they were in their teens. The youngest accuser, Leigh Corfman, said she was 14 and Moore was 32 when he sexually touched her.
Mike Ortiz, an ex-boyfriend of Corfman told CNN she relayed the story to him when they dated for about two years around 2009. Corfman's description to the Post fits what she told him to a tee, he said.
"But I believed her when she told me and I still believe her," he said on CNN. "She wouldn't lie about something like that."
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Conservative talk radio host Sean Hannity asked Moore Friday on his show whether Moore would have dated teenagers when he was in his 30s.
"No, not generally," said Moore, who also said he always asked the permission of a girl's mother before dating her.
Republicans are scrambling ahead of the Dec. 12 special Senate election between Moore and Democrat Doug Jones, with the deadline for replacing a candidate on the ballot well past.