WEINSTEIN IN RETRIAL OVER RAPE CHARGE
Judge ‘unfair’ but mogul stays in jail
A COURT has overturned Harvey Weinstein’s rape conviction and said the disgraced Hollywood mogul must face a new trial.
It ruled that the judge in the 2020 proceedings, which led to a 23-year jail sentence, had prejudiced the jury with improper rulings.
These included letting women testify about allegations not part of the case.
Despite yesterday’s shock decision, Weinstein will stay in jail because in 2023 he was sentenced to 16 years for raping a Los Angeles model.
The 4-3 ruling from the New York Court of Appeals – the state’s highest legal authority – said: “The trial admitted testimony of uncharged, alleged prior sexual acts against persons other than the complainants.”
Judge James Burke “compounded that error” by ruling that if Weinstein testified he could be grilled about those allegations as well as others that portrayed him in a highly prejudicial light.
It concluded: “The remedy for these egregious errors is a new trial.” In a stinging dissent, Judge Madeline Singas wrote that the court was continuing a “disturbing trend of overturning verdicts in cases of sexual violence”. The New York ruling will reopen painful #MeToo memories for women who could again be forced to testify. Debra Katz, who represented several, said her clients were “feeling gutted” but their evidence had changed the world. Actress Ashley Judd, one of the first to accuse Weinstein, said: “That’s really hard for the survivors. We still live in our truth. And we know what happened.” Weinstein, 72, was convicted in New York of forcibly performing a sex act on a film production assistant in 2006 and the third degree rape of an actress in 2013. His lawyer, Arthur Aidala, said the ruling was “a victory not only for Mr Weinstein but for every defendant in New York state.” It is the second big #MeToo setback in two years after the US Supreme Court refused to hear an appeal of a Pennsylvania court decision to throw out Bill Cosby’s sexual assault conviction.
It’s really hard for survivors. We still live in our truth. We know what happened
ACTRESS ASHLEY JUDD ONE OF MOGUL’S FIRST ACCUSERS