Harvey Weinstein’s lawyers oppose effort to combine two sex crimes cases
Harvey Weinstein’s attorneys have submitted a filing opposing a move by prosecutors to combine two sexual crimes cases against the disgraced film mogul.
Harvey Weinstein’s attorneys have submitted a filing opposing a move by prosecutors to combine two sexual crimes cases against the disgraced film mogul.
Manhattan prosecutors have sought to consolidate new charges with ones previously brought against Weinstein so that they could be tried in court together. But in a court document, a response to the prosecutors' motion to consolidate cases filed Oct. 2, the Oscar-winning producer’s lawyers accused the district attorney’s office of acting improperly and unfairly.
“Having deprived Defendant of a fair trial once,” Weinstein’s lawyers write in a 12-page filing, “the People unapologetically—indeed, unabashedly—seek to do so again by smuggling an additional charge into the case for the improper purpose of bolstering the credibility of the complainant in the 2024 indictment.”
The Manhattan District Attorney's office responded in a filing to say that consolidation is warranted in this case "because of the compelling public interest in avoiding lengthy, burdensome, duplicative trials that would waste party and judicial resources, further clog the court system, and burden multiple juries—benefits that defendant’s opposition does not even contest."
In early 2020, a jury in New York convicted Weinstein of third-degree rape against Jessica Mann, a former aspiring actor, and first-degree criminal sex act against Mimi Haley, a former “Project Runway” production assistant. (He was acquitted of two counts of predatory sexual assault and a count of first-degree rape.)
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