Can jury possibly ignore all that they’ve heard about him?
FOR once, the hype is justified – this is ‘the trial of the decade’. At stake is not just harvey Weinstein’s own fate, but the outcome of the MeToo movement that it spawned.
If Weinstein is found guilty of crimes that are sufficiently serious to put him behind bars for the rest of his life, it will be seen by some as the defining victory over predatory male behaviour.
But if his lawyers manage to get him cleared, it will not only mortify his accusers but may bolster those who believe that the demonisation of men has gone too far.
Weinstein’s team has never tried to deny that he’s a serial philanderer and certainly no marital saint.
however, his lawyers insist that he is not a criminal. They say his accusers are either lying or had affairs with him that were entirely consensual, part of hollywood’s ugly but long-standing sex-forwork ‘casting couch’.
In total, he faces five charges: Two of ‘predatory sexual assault’, one of criminal sexual assault and two of rape.
Weinstein is charged with raping one unnamed woman at a Manhattan hotel in 2013 and forcibly performing a sex act on Mimi haleyi, a former production assistant for his company, at his new York home in 2006.
he has denied all charges (the new York trial isn’t connected to his tentative $25million settlement reached with 30 accusers in a civil case, and Weinstein could still be charged in Los Angeles by prosecutors examining eight sexual misconduct accusations against him).
The trial promises to be complicated and much will depend on the jury. Selection of the panel is expected to last about two weeks of what is likely to be an eightweek trial. US lawyers go to enormous lengths to ensure jurors are as sympathetic to their side as possible and Weinstein’s team is expected to call hundreds of prospective candidates. Although they’d prefer them to know little about the case, this is unlikely given Weinstein’s notoriety.
The ex-producer – who was pictured using a walking frame for back pain at a court appearance last month – has already tried unsuccessfully to have his trial moved outside new York on the grounds it will be impossible for him to have a fair trial in the city.
Critics wryly questioned why Weinstein assumed his reputation was any better elsewhere. Legal experts, meanwhile, have warned of the challenges that jury selection in this trial presents, as potential jurors may try to hide their bias for or against Weinstein so they can exploit their selection to advance a bigger cause.
Lawyers are allowed to excuse an unlimited number of potential jurors if they show bias in the case – they’ll be particularly anxious to identify women who say they’ve been victims of sexual misconduct. The defence team will make potential jurors fill out lengthy questionnaires, and will also be reviewing potential jurors’ social media use to uncover bias.
however, Weinstein lawyer Donna Rotunno said she was confident of new Yorkers’ innate honesty. ‘Once 12 people are put on that bench and they realise the gravity of it, they really want to be fair,’ she said this week.
Dozens of other women have said publicly that they, too, experienced highly inappropriate behaviour at Weinstein’s hands, ranging from sexual harassment to rape. According to them, Weinstein’s modus operandi – such as luring them up to his hotel room or office on the pretext of discussing film work and then asking for a massage – was often the same.
EMPLOYInG the same tactic used to convict the actor Bill Cosby of sexual assault last year, prosecutors want to introduce these women’s testimony to establish a pattern of predatory behaviour by Weinstein in committing ‘prior bad acts’.
Such testimony can be devastating in swaying the outcome.
Prosecutors are expected to call four such witnesses, including The Sopranos actress Annabella Sciorra. She accused Weinstein of raping her in the early 1990s and sexually harassing her repeatedly over subsequent years.
Sciorra says she still lives in fear of him, sleeping with a baseball bat by her bed.
The three other corroborating unnamed accusers will testify about incidents that took place in 2004, 2005 and 2013.
The defence has indicated that it, too, has a star witness – a close friend of the unnamed rape accuser. The friend will testify that this accuser and Weinstein were in a consensual relationship and that the woman concerned went to a Weinstein Company test screening just hours after the alleged rape.
According to former Weinstein lawyer Ben Brafman, the accuser didn’t mention the rape to her friend until years later, when she allegedly tried to enlist the friend’s help in pursuing charges.
The challenge for the defence will be to get the jury to ignore everything else they’ve already heard about Weinstein, and stick to the accusations for which he’s charged.
After the widespread public disembowelment of Weinstein’s reputation over the past two years, it might seem impossible that he can escape a guilty verdict.
however, his defence team needs only to plant a seed of doubt in the jury’s mind to win.
Whichever way the trial goes, it is likely to be one hell of a courtroom drama.