H. Brandt Ayers, former publisher and now chairman of the company that publishes The Anniston Star, spanked female employees in the 1970s, several former staffers claim.

The allegations come from female employees who said they were targeted and sexually abused by Ayers, now 82, while working in the paper's newsroom. One of the women, Veronica Pike Kennedy, told the Alabama Political Reporter she was working at the newspaper early one Saturday when Ayers approached her about an editorial he had written and then told her she was being a "bad girl" and he would "have to spank" her.

Kennedy said Ayers pulled her out of her chair, bent her over a desk and spanked her 18 times with a metal ruler. The incident was witnessed by another Star reporter who allegedly confirmed the account. Kennedy was 22 at the time of the alleged incident; Ayers was in his early 40s.

Several other female Star staffers reported similar contact with Ayers.

Ayers issued a statement through a Jan. 1 story published in The Star.

"As a very young man with more authority than judgment, I did some things I regret," Ayers said. "At my advanced age I wish I could relive those days again, knowing the seriousness of my position and with the accumulated judgment that goes with age."

The allegations against Ayers were first detailed in an article in the Alabama Political Reporter by Eddie Burkhalter, a former Star reporter who left the newspaper in November after allegedly being prevented from reporting on the story. The Star's current staff began looking into the story when Joey Kennedy, an Alabama Political Reporter columnist and Veronica Kennedy's husband, mentioned the incident - both not the publisher or the newspaper involved - in November, The Star said.

Ayers, the son of the newspaper's founder Harry Ayers, took over as publisher of the The Star in 1969, remaining in the position until 2016. He now serves as chairman of the board of Consolidated Publishing, publisher of The Star, The Daily Home and several weekly newspapers, and writes a column for the newspapers. Among his recent subjects was Roy Moore, the failed Republican Senate candidate who has been accused of having improper sexual contact with teenage girls in the 1970s.