Wein's team gets e-mail OK
Can use gals’ own words against them
Harvey Weinstein’s lawyers can reference loving e-mails the disgraced producer’s alleged victims sent him as the defense makes opening arguments in his rape trial Wednesday, a judge ruled Tuesday.
Justice James Burke said “the substance and contents” of the e-mails are permitted but the defense cannot display slides of the actual e-mails.
“It is consistent with allowing the defense, the defendant, to put forward his plainly stated legitimate defense that the sexual activity was consensual,” Burke said in his oral decision delivered in Manhattan Supreme Court the day before opening arguments in the trial.
Defense lawyer Damon Cheronis argued that witnesses who have accused Weinstein of sexually assaulting them “also bragged about being in sexual relationships” with the pervy producer. The attorney did not specify the number of alleged victims who had sent affectionate e-mails to Weinstein.
“The state cannot weave a story of power and anger and sexual assault and think we cannot counter that,” Cheronis said. “What we will counter with are their own words, their own words where they describe their loving relationships.”
It was previously reported that one of Weinstein’s accusers wrote “I love you, always do. But I hate feeling like a booty call. :)” after he allegedly raped her.
Assistant DA Joan Illuzzi-Orbon said that the defense’s characterization of Weinstein’s relationships with his alleged victims was “blatantly inaccurate.”
Both sides said they plan to use PowerPoint slides in their opening arguments Wednesday, which Cheronis will deliver for the defense and Assistant DA Meghan Hast for the prosecution.
Hast intends to use photographs of the alleged victims in the opening statement, prosecutors said.
Weinstein faces two counts of predatory sexual assault, two counts of rape and one count of criminal sex act stemming from the allegations of three women.
A state appeals court, meanwhile, denied Weinstein’s 11th-hour bid to move his trial out of Manhattan.
The Appellate Division First Department gave the decision Wednesday afternoon.
Weinstein lawyer Arthur Aidala filed an emergency motion on Thursday asking for the change of venue, arguing that the summoning of supermodel Gigi Hadid as a prospective juror triggered negative publicity and created a “carnivallike atmosphere.”
The appeals court shot down a similar request to move the trial last August.
Lead defense attorney Donna Rotunno declined to comment.
Weinstein is accused of forcing oral sex on production assistant
Mimi Haleyi in 2006 and raping another woman, who has not been publicly named, in 2013.
The predatory sexual-assault charges relate to “The Sopranos” actress Annabella Sciorra’s allegations that Weinstein raped her in late 1993 or early 1994.
Weinstein, who has denied having nonconsensual sex, faces up to life in prison if convicted.