‘A new day’: Weinstein convicted
Former Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein was convicted of rape and sexual assault against two women and led off to prison in handcuffs yesterday in what his foes hailed as a landmark moment for the legal system and a long overdue reckoning for the man vilified as the biggest monster of the #MeToo era.
The 67-year-old Weinstein had a look of resignation on his face as he heard the verdict: guilty on two charges, not guilty on a set of more serious ones.
While it was not the acrossthe-board victory prosecutors and his accusers had hoped for, it could put the stooped and feeblelooking Weinstein behind bars for the rest of his life. The charges carry up to 29 years in prison.
District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. saluted the women who came forward against the once-feared studio boss, saying they ‘‘changed the course of history in the fight against sexual violence’’ and ‘‘pulled our justice system into the 21st century’’.
‘‘This is the new landscape for survivors of sexual assault in America, I believe, and it is a new day. It is a new day because Harvey Weinstein has finally been held accountable for crimes he committed,’’ Vance said.
Weinstein’s lawyers said they will appeal.
‘‘Harvey is unbelievably strong. He took it like a man,’’ defence attorney Donna Rotunno said. ‘‘He knows that we will continue to fight for him, and we know that this is not over.’’ Another of his lawyers, Arthur Aidala, quoted Weinstein as telling as his legal team: ‘‘I’m innocent. I’m innocent. I’m innocent. How could this happen in America?’’
The jury of seven men and five women took five days to find Weinstein guilty of raping an aspiring actress in a New York City hotel room in 2013 and sexually assaulting production assistant Mimi Haleyi at his apartment in 2006 by forcibly performing oral sex on her.
He was acquitted on the most serious charges, two counts of predatory sexual assault, each carrying up to life in prison.
Both of those counts hinged on the testimony of actress Annabella Sciorra, who said Weinstein barged into her apartment, raped her and forcibly performed oral sex on her in the
mid-1990s.
Judge James Burke ordered Weinstein taken to jail immediately. Court officers handcuffed Weinstein and put their arms under his, leading him unsteadily out of the courtroom via a side door without the use of the walker he relied on for much of the trial. He was later taken from the courthouse in an ambulance, strapped to a stretcher in his suit, in what was believed to be just a precautionary measure, and taken to a locked unit at Bellevue Hospital rather than Rikers Island jail.
The judge said he will ask that Weinstein, who had been free on bail since his arrest nearly two years ago, be held in the infirmary after his lawyers said he needs medical attention following unsuccessful back surgery.
Sentencing was set for March
11. The sexual assault charge carries up to 25 years in prison, while the third-degree rape count is punishable by up to four years. (The jury acquitted Weinstein of first-degree rape, which requires the use of force or the threat of it, and found him guilty of thirddegree rape, which involves a lack of consent.)
The verdict followed weeks of often harrowing and excruciatingly graphic testimony from a string of accusers who told of rapes, forced oral sex, groping, masturbation, lewd propositions and excuses from Weinstein about how the Hollywood casting couch works. In addition to the three women he was charged with attacking, three more who said they were attacked by Weinstein testified in an effort by prosecutors to show a pattern of brutish behaviour.
Whispers about Weinstein circulated in Hollywood for years before they finally turned into a torrent of accusations in 2017 that destroyed his career and gave rise to #MeToo, the global movement to encourage women to come forward and hold powerful men accountable for their sexual misconduct.
The trial was the first criminal case to arise from the barrage of allegations against Weinstein from more than 90 women, including actresses Gwyneth Paltrow, Salma Hayek, Ashley Judd, Uma Thurman and Mira Sorvino. Most of those cases were too old to prosecute.
While prosecutors and other Weinstein foes were disappointed by his acquittal on the most serious charges, they exulted over the guilty verdicts.
‘‘The era of impunity for powerful men who rape people is over,’’ Sorvino said, breaking down in tears on a conference call of Weinstein’s former accusers. ‘‘He will rot in jail as he deserves.’’
While Weinstein did not testify, his lawyers contended that any sexual contact was consensual and that his accusers went to bed with him to get ahead in Hollywood.
The defence seized on the fact that the two women he was convicted of attacking had sex with him – and sent him warm and even flirty emails – well after he supposedly attacked them.
In the end, that argument didn’t seem to gain any traction. Instead, the jury had trouble with Sciorra’s allegations.
Four days into deliberations, the jurors sent out a note indicating they were deadlocked on the two predatory sexual assault counts but had reached a unanimous verdict on the others. The judge told them to keep on deliberating.
After the verdict, jury foreman Bernard Cody was asked what the deliberations were like for him personally and responded: ‘‘Devastating.’’ He did not elaborate.
Sciorra said in statement: ‘‘While we hope for continued righteous outcomes that bring absolute justice, we can never regret breaking the silence. For in speaking truth to power we pave the way for a more just culture, free of the scourge of violence against women.’’
The Associated Press does not typically identify people who say they are victims of sex crimes unless they grant permission, as Haleyi and Sciorra did.
The phenomenally successful movie executive helped bring to the screen such Oscar winners as Good Will Hunting, Pulp Fiction, The King’s Speech, Silver Linings Playbook and Shakespeare in Love and nurtured the careers of celebrated film-makers like Quentin Tarantino and Kevin Smith.
Weinstein now faces charges in Los Angeles. In that case, authorities allege he raped one woman and sexually assaulted another on back-to-back nights during Oscars week in 2013. –
‘‘The era of impunity for powerful men who rape people is over ..... he will rot in jail as he deserves.’’ Mira Sorvino