Victim’s sobs halt Harvey’s rape trial
Aspiring actress tells of pervy acts in shower
Harvey Weinstein’s rape and sexual assault trial came to a sudden stop Monday when the latest accuser to testify against him began crying uncontrollably on the stand.
Jessica Mann, 34, began to hyperventilate during crossexamination with Weinstein’s lead attorney Donna Rotunno while reading aloud an email she sent to her ex-boyfriend in May 2014.
In the message, Mann writes about her troubled upbringing and further attempts to explain her dysfunctional relationship with Weinstein.
“My secret and my fear is knowing that a part of the dynamic I had with Harvey would mean you would never talk to me,” Mann wrote in the email. “I told you that sometimes I felt hopeless and that I should just be with an older man because I am a lost cause.”
The plaintiff broke down as she read a part of the email in which she wrote about being sexually abused in her youth.
“I remember the day I realized I was controlling my world because I was sexually assaulted, and that story played out where I played into sexual dynamics with people,” Mann wrote. “I tried to make [Weinstein] my pseudofather.”
Manhattan Supreme Court Justice James Burke quickly dismissed the jury for a brief recess when Mann broke down into tears. When she returned several minutes later still sobbing and clutching her chest, the judge adjourned proceedings for the day.
Earlier Monday, Mann told the jury of a disturbing encounter with Weinstein on an unspecified date in a Los Angeles hotel room.
“He asked me to come into the shower and then he said to me, ‘Have you ever had a golden shower?’ And I said, ‘No.’ And then I felt him peeing on me,” she said.
“I was in shock by it, it was gross,” she said. “I turned into the corner of the shower and just looked away.”
Mann, a former aspiring actress who has accused the fallen Hollywood titan of raping her on two separate occasions, testified during her second day on the stand about having to constantly deal with predatory
Weinstein’s advances.
“I was panicked because I had this dynamic with Harvey where I always felt like I had to obey — jump. I just lived on edge a little bit,” Mann said during cross-examination.
“The abuse occurred when he was unpredictable.”
The Washington State native is one of two women at the heart of the charges against Weinstein in his New York case. He faces two counts of rape for an alleged incident at the DoubleTree hotel in New York on March 18, 2013.
She alleges that Weinstein raped her again later that year while she was working as a hairdresser at the Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills.
Weinstein, 67, has pleaded not guilty to two counts of rape, two counts of predatory sexual assault and one count of criminal sexual act. If convicted on the top charge, he faces a maximum of life in prison.
In reading the 2014 email to her boyfriend, Mann revealed more details about Weinstein’s reportedly “deformed” genitalia.
“I was close enough to him to tell you that he no longer has a working penis. On the lower half of his body, he had some kind of surgery or burn and he’s lucky to have his parts,” Mann wrote.
“I never asked what happened.”