WHAT HAPPENED TO HARVEY WEINSTEIN?
Brigitte Kimichik • January 7, 2020
What happened to Harvey Weinstein?
Weinstein’s long anticipated rape trial commenced in NY yesterday morning
with preliminary hearings and jury selection to begin today.
He faces felony charges on two counts of predatory sexual assault, two counts of rape, and one count of a criminal sexual act relating to two alleged incidents and two victims, one who remains anonymous. If found guilty, he is facing life in prison. With many of his 80 plus accusers in the audience and frenzied international media coverage, his trial is promising to stir up deep emotions and renewed outrage at what Weinstein got away with for decades.
His third round of defense lawyers
will claim Weinstein may have had affairs, cheated on his wife and lied—making him immoral and reprehensible, but he never raped anyone and all of his encounters were consensual. They will introduce evidence that the alleged victims in this trial maintained friendly relations with Weinstein long after the supposed assaults. The prosecution will be permitted to introduce prior bad act witnesses to help establish a pattern of behavior (which proved successful in Bill Cosby’s trial). Picking a fair and impartial jury will prove challenging. In a recent Newsweek article, his lead defense attorney,
Donna Rotunno claims
“that the media has tainted the jury pool by spreading their pre-trail judgment across America and the world.” In a recent CBS interview, she claimed further that the #MeToo movement “allows the court of public opinion to take over the narrative” and “puts you [the defendant] in a position where you [the defendant] [are] stripped of your rights.”
What about the 80 plus victims? Just today news broke that Weinstein is facing more charges of rape and sexual assault in LA County and that a warrant may have been issued for Weinstein’s arrest.
In case you are feeling sorry for Weinstein, please don’t! In an exclusive interview with The Post, Weinstein complains that despite the many allegations, he is not being remembered for his charity work or “for all he did professionally for women” throughout his career, including a lucrative contract he gave Gwyneth Paltrow, one of his 80 plus accusers.
He continues to deny all of the sexual assault allegations and claims his work has been forgotten. Rebecca Rosenberg at Vox reports on his interview.
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