WARNING: This article may affect those who have experienced sexual violence or know someone affected by it.
Jurors will soon weigh the case against former movie studio boss Harvey Weinstein, who is standing trial for a second time in New York on sexual assault charges.
The trial, which began in a Manhattan criminal court on April 23, moved on to closing arguments Tuesday without testimony from Weinstein.
Deliberations by the jury — made up of seven women and five men, with five people serving as alternates — could begin Tuesday afternoon or Wednesday.
Weinstein, 73, is accused of raping an actress and assaulting two women in what prosecutors have called a pattern in which the disgraced movie producer used his power and influence to lure in victims and then keep them silent.
The Miramax studio co-founder has pleaded not guilty and has denied ever having non-consensual sex with anyone. Weinstein, suffering from a litany of health problems, was present throughout the trial in a wheelchair.
Weinstein returned to court five years after he was convicted of rape and sexual assault by a New York jury, for a new trial covering many of the very same allegations — plus one that hasn’t been tried before.
That trial and a whirlwind of other allegations against Weinstein from women in the film and television industry, including some prominent movie stars, propelled the #MeToo movement against sexual misconduct.
The retrial is happening because New York’s top court last year threw out Weinstein’s 2020 conviction. The high court found that the previous trial judge allowed prejudicial testimony about allegations separate from the charges.
Here’s what you need to know about Weinstein’s retrial as the case nears a close.
New York’s highest court has overturned Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 conviction for sexual assault and rape, a landmark ruling of the #MeToo movement. Andrew Chang explains how the prosecution knew it was taking a gamble, and where that gamble went wrong.
Weinstein not testifying
Weinstein opted not to testify at his New York retrial, his lawyer Arthur Aidala said Sunday night. It was a fraught decision for the 73-year-old, who didn’t testify at previous trials in New York and California and was convicted in both.
He denies the allegations, and Aidala has said that Weinstein was carefully weighing whether to take the stand this time.
Speaking outside court on Thursday, Aidala said that Weinstein thought a lot of holes had been poked in the accusers’ accounts, but that he also was pondering whether jurors would feel they needed to hear from him.
In the U.S., defendants in criminal cases aren’t obligated to testify, and many decide not to, for various reasons. Among them: the prospect of being questioned by prosecutors.
Who are the accusers?
He’s charged in New York with raping Jessica Mann in 2013 and forcing oral sex on Miriam Haley and Kaja Sokola, separately, in 2006.
Mann was an actor and hairstylist, Haley a production assistant and producer, and Sokola a model who aspired to an acting career.
It was the first time prosecutors publicly identified Sokola and detailed her account of what unfolded between her and the Oscar-winning movie producer in the early 2000s. She has also accused him in a civil lawsuit of groping her against her will four years earlier, when she was 16.
Like the two other accusers in the case, Sokola alleges a complex series of encounters and reactions — being sexually assaulted, yet staying in touch; wary of Weinstein but wanting to remain on good terms with a Hollywood power broker who dangled the possibility of an acting career.
The Associated Press does not generally identify people alleging sexual assault unless they consent to be named, as Haley, Mann and Sokola have done.
What are the accusations?
All three women testified for days at the retrial, giving emotional and graphic accounts of what they say they endured.
They said Weinstein suggested he’d help them achieve their show-business dreams, but then manoeuvred them into private settings and preyed on them.
Haley, a former TV production assistant, was the first to testify and recalled the alleged events of July 2006.
She said she accepted an invitation to visit Weinstein’s Manhattan apartment one early evening because she felt it would have been odd to decline; she was due to fly on his company’s dime to Los Angeles the next day to see a premiere of the film Clerks II, which Weinstein’s company co-produced.
After she and Weinstein briefly chatted on his living room sofa, he lunged to kiss her, she testified. She said she leapt up and rejected him, but he grabbed her and forcibly backed her into a bedroom.
Then, Haley said, he pinned her down on a bed and performed oral sex on her, ignoring her pleas that she didn’t want it.
Sokola, an aspiring actor at the time, told jurors Weinstein put his hand inside her underwear and made her touch his genitals at a Manhattan apartment in 2002.
Mann, a 39-year-old cosmetologist and hairstylist, was the last of three accusers to testify in the case and the one with arguably the most complicated history with Weinstein.
She said she met Weinstein at a party in late 2012 or early 2013, when she was 27 and had recently moved to Los Angeles to try to launch an acting career.
She said he took an interest in her ambitions, and they had a few followup meetings that alternated between professional talk and boundary-pushing.
In March 2013, she said she travelled to New York with a friend. After the pals made plans for breakfast with Weinstein, he showed up early and got a room at Mann’s hotel, over her protests, she said.
Weeping and wiping her eyes on the witness stand, she said she went upstairs with Weinstein to try to avoid a public argument and told him, “I don’t want to do this,” but he shoved the door shut as she tried to leave.
After Weinstein demanded she undress and grabbed her arms, she said she “just gave up.” Mann said he then had sex with her — after, she believes, injecting himself with an erection-promoting drug that she later found in the bathroom trash.
Mann told no one about the alleged rape. She said that she doubted she’d be believed and feared reprisals from the well-connected Weinstein.
Weinstein’s lawyers have argued that anything that happened between him and his accusers was consensual.
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Will Weinstein go free if he’s acquitted at this trial?
Weinstein had been serving a 23-year sentence in a prison in upstate Rome, N.Y., when his first conviction was overturned. But even if he’s acquitted in this trial, he’s not a free man.
Last year, he rejected an extradition request from California, where he was found guilty of rape, forced oral copulation and another sexual misconduct count involving a woman known as Jane Doe 1, after a two-month trial held in Los Angeles in late 2022.
He was sentenced early the following year to 16 years in prison, which was to begin after the New York sentence was served.
Weinstein’s conviction in California is subject to review, but in the wake of the overturning of the New York verdict, legal experts said that the two states had rules that differed regarding testimony about prior acts and behaviour.
An L.A. judge has sentenced Harvey Weinstein to 16 years in prison following his conviction for the rape and sexual assault of the accuser known as ‘Jane Doe 1.’ The former movie producer will serve the sentence after his current 23-year sentence in New York.
If you’re in immediate danger or fear for your safety or that of others around you, please call 911. For support in your area, you can look for crisis lines and local services via the Ending Violence Association of Canada database.
