NEW YORK:
Harvey Weinstein has been hit with new prison expenses, a prosecutor stated Thursday, because the Manhattan district lawyer’s workplace prepares to retry the previous film mogul after his rape conviction was overturned.
Jurors in Manhattan discovered Weinstein, 72, responsible of rape expenses in 2020, however the New York Courtroom of Appeals overturned the conviction in April, discovering that Weinstein didn’t obtain a good trial as a result of a decide improperly allowed testimony from accusers he was not formally accused of assaulting.
Manhattan prosecutors stated in July they have been investigating extra violent sexual assaults allegedly dedicated by Weinstein after extra girls agreed to testify in opposition to the Miramax studio co-founder. He has denied having nonconsensual sexual encounters with anybody.
Throughout a listening to earlier than Decide Curtis Farber in New York state court docket in Manhattan on Thursday, prosecutor Nicole Blumberg stated a grand jury had indicted Harvey Weinstein on extra expenses, however didn’t specify what these crimes have been.
Weinstein was not in court docket for the listening to. He was rushed to the hospital from New York’s Rikers Island jail on Sunday to bear emergency coronary heart surgical procedure, and his attorneys say he’s ill.
Weinstein’s protection lawyer, Arthur Aidala, stated the grand jury was investigating three “points,” however didn’t know whether or not that referred to particular incidents or the variety of accusers.
Farber has tentatively set a trial date of Nov. 12. Blumberg stated Thursday that prosecutors would nonetheless be ready to go to trial on that date. Aidala informed reporters that his crew would attempt to delay any trial that contained new expenses.
Regardless of the overturning of his New York conviction, Weinstein stays in jail in New York on a separate rape conviction in California.
On the listening to, Farber ordered Weinstein to stay in custody at Bellevue Hospital, concluding that his most up-to-date medical checks confirmed he was not receiving ample remedy at Rikers.
A #METOO MILESTONE
Weinstein’s preliminary conviction in New York was a milestone for the #MeToo motion, through which girls have accused tons of of males in leisure, media, politics and different fields of sexual misconduct.
A jury discovered that Weinstein sexually assaulted former manufacturing assistant Miriam Haley in 2006 and raped aspiring actress Jessica Mann in 2013. They’re amongst greater than 80 girls who’ve accused him of sexual misconduct.
Weinstein was sentenced to 23 years in jail for the New York case and 16 years in jail for the separate California case.
In that case, a Los Angeles jury discovered Weinstein responsible of rape, forcible oral copulation and sexual penetration by a international object involving a lady, however acquitted him of expenses associated to a second accuser.
The decide overseeing the case declared a mistrial on the counts the place the jury couldn’t attain a verdict, together with allegations made by Siebel Newsom, spouse of California Gov. Gavin Newsom.
The California conviction was not affected by the New York excessive court docket ruling. Weinstein has not begun serving his California sentence.
Miramax’s hit movies embrace “Shakespeare in Love” and “Pulp Fiction.” Weinstein’s movie studio filed for chapter in March 2018 after the allegations in opposition to him precipitated its implosion.
On the New York trial, Weinstein was portrayed as a serial predator who manipulated girls with guarantees of profession development in Hollywood, coaxing them into resort rooms or non-public residences after which overpowering and violently attacking them.
Throughout his sentencing listening to in Manhattan in 2020, Weinstein stated he was involved in regards to the “1000’s of males who’re dropping due course of” in the course of the #MeToo motion.
