Weinstein: Key accuser’s case is dropped
HARVEY Weinstein’s lawyers claimed a victory yesterday after new evidence suggested his relationship with one of his alleged victims was consensual.
Prosecutors in New York said they were dropping the count relating to Lucia Evans, who claimed the movie boss forced her to perform a sex act on him in 2004.
An unsealed letter from the prosecutors suggests Miss Evans admitted to a friend that she performed a sex act on the movie producer in exchange for a job in acting, and flashed her breasts at him.
Assistant District Attorney Joan IlluzziOrbon told a judge they were moving ‘full steam ahead’ with the other five charges involving two other women which include rape and could see Weinstein jailed for life.
But the development puts pressure on a case that has become the litmus test of justice in the MeToo era. In court Weinstein’s lawyer Ben Brafman said the case should
‘Flashed at him in restaurant’
be dismissed because the ‘integrity of these proceedings has been compromised’.
After the hearing he suggested Miss Evans could be prosecuted for perjury.
Mr Brafman said: ‘Sexual assault is a serious crime but falsely accusing someone of sexual assault is also a serious crime.’
Miss Evans’ lawyer Carrie Goldberg accused prosecutors of abandoning her.
She said: ‘Let me be clear: the decision to throw away my client’s sexual assault charges says nothing about Weinstein’s guilt or innocence. Nor does it reflect on Lucia’s consistent allegation that she was sexually assaulted with force.’
The development comes nearly a year ago to the day after reports in the New Yorker magazine and New York Times outed Weinstein as an alleged serial abuser and began the MeToo movement. As a result he was forced out of his movie company and his $300million empire crumbled.
Miss Evans, now a marketing executive, was among the women who went on the record in the New Yorker article to claim Weinstein attacked her when she was a 21-year-old aspiring actress.
The Manhattan Criminal Court unsealed a letter sent from Miss Illuzzi-Orbon to Mr Brafman dated September 12 which explained why they were dropping the charge. Miss Illuzzi- Orbon said they had spoken to a witness – a friend of Miss Evans – whose version of events was ‘at odds with the factual account’ Miss Evans had given.
In August this year prosecutors spoke with the witness who said they were there when Miss Evans first met Weinstein at a bar in the summer of 2004.
The witness said Weinstein ‘offered to give them cash if they exposed their breasts to him’.
The witness refused but later Miss Evans supposedly admitted she had shown her breasts to Weinstein in the restaurant. The witness said Miss Evans had told her she had later gone to Weinstein’s office for a meeting where he propositioned her and she performed a sex act on him.
Separately, the letter said prosecutors had obtained a draft email Miss Evans wrote to her husband in 2015 with an account of the alleged incident which ‘differs’ from what she told prosecutors.
Weinstein, 66, denies all allegations of nonconsensual sex and is on $1million bail.