Prosecutors in LA recently said they were reviewing eight cases accusing Weinstein of sexual assault.
HARVEY WEINSTEIN HAS been indicted on new sex crime charges in Los Angles, just as his trial on separate rape and sexual assault charges in New York was poised to get under way.
“I want to commend the victims who have come forward and bravely recounted what happened to them. It is my hope that all victims of sexual violence find strength and healing as they move forward.” Earlier today, Weinstein entered the courthouse in New York leaning on a walking frame following recent back surgery. Asked outside court how his back felt, Weinstein responded with a thin smile and a so-so gesture with his hand.
“He looked cowardly. He wouldn’t look at us. He wouldn’t make eye contact,” said Sarah Ann Masse, a performer and writer who said Weinstein once sexually harassed her in his underwear during a job interview. “This trial is a cultural reckoning regardless of its legal outcome,” she said. For that to happen, prosecutors must demonstrate he had a habit of violating women, beyond the two directly involved in the encounters in which he is charged. They plan to call actress Annabella Sciorra, who says Weinstein forced his way into her Manhattan apartment in 1993 or 1994 and raped her after she starred in a film for his movie studio.
One of those women said she had an encounter with Weinstein at a Manhattan hotel in 2004. A second was to give evidence about an interaction with Weinstein at a SoHo apartment in 2005. A third was described in court papers as having had an incident with Weinstein at a hotel in Beverly Hills, California, in February 2013.