Bob Weinstein says he wants brother Harvey 'to get the justice he deserves'

In an interview, Harvey Weinstein’s brother says ‘My brother has caused unconscionable suffering … I am heartbroken for the women that he has harmed’

The movie executive Bob Weinstein has launched an extraordinary attack on his elder sibling, the disgraced Harvey Weinstein, insisting he had no idea about “the type of predator that he was” and saying he is sickened by his “depraved” sibling’s apparent lack of remorse over decades of alleged sexual misconduct.

In an interview with the Hollywood Reporter, the younger Weinstein who cofounded Miramax and The Weinstein Company (TWC) said: “I want him to get the justice that he deserves.”

Later on Saturday, the board of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences was due to hold an emergency meeting to discuss potential action against the elder Weinstein, 65, who since the first accusations emerged last week has faced allegations of sexual misconduct from more than two dozen women and three of rape.

Police forces in the US and the UK have announced that they are investigating allegations. Weinstein has apologised for elements of his past behaviour but unequivocally denied any allegations of non-consensual sex. He has also said he hopes to get a second chance.

In a statement issued after the New Yorker detailed allegations of rape, the TWC board said it was “shocked and dismayed” and “committed to assisting with our full energies in all criminal or other investigations of these alleged acts”.

Sallie Hofmeister, a spokesperson for Harvey Weinstein, said: “Any allegations of non-consensual sex are unequivocally denied by Mr Weinstein. With respect to any women who have made allegations on the record, Mr Weinstein believes that all of these relationships were consensual.”

The scandal has destroyed Harvey Weinstein’s reputation as one of Hollywood’s leading executives, which he acquired as a co-founder of the Miramax and Weinstein Company studios. The producer of Oscar-winning films The Artist and The English Patient, and patron to directors Quentin Tarantino and Steven Soderbergh, he was dropped by the TWC board soon after being placed on indefinite leave earlier this week, while he underwent therapy.

Bob Weinstein, 62, told the Hollywood Reporter he had barely spoken to his brother in almost five years.

“I could not take his cheating, his lying and also his attitude toward everyone,” he said. While he said he was aware his brother was “philandering with every woman he could meet”, he insisted he had little idea about the alleged predatory harassment that has come to light.

“I have a brother that’s indefensible and crazy,” he said. “I find myself in a waking nightmare. My brother has caused unconscionable suffering. As a father of three girls I say this with every bone in my body – I am heartbroken for the women that he has harmed.”

Bob Weinstein insisted TWC could survive, despite widespread predictions it will be forced to close or sell parts or all of the business. “There is a plan to come out on the other side,” he said.

Weinstein often became emotional, the Reporter said. He and his brother, he said, ran separate companies so many of the people Harvey Weinstein did business with – actors, actresses – he had never met. He declined to discuss specifics of the case, including claims that the TWC board of directors were aware of settlements with several of his brother’s accusers.

“The members of the board, including myself, did not know the extent of my brother’s actions,” he said.

“I know him on a personal level better than anyone. It’s hard to describe how I feel that he took out the emptiness inside of him in so many sick and depraved ways. It’s a sickness but not a sickness that is excusable. It’s a sickness that’s inexcusable. And I, as a brother, understood and was aware as a family member, that my brother needed help and that something was wrong.”

He also said he believed the Academy should expel his brother. Its 54-member board, made up of leading actors, directors and executives including Tom Hanks, Whoopi Goldberg and Steven Spielberg, was meeting to consider that question on Saturday. The Oscar awarded to the producer in 1999 for his work on Shakespeare In Love may also be considered for nullification, according to reports.

The British Academy Film Awards (Bafta) has suspended Weinstein’s membership, and organisers of the Cannes film festival said they were dismayed.

Bob Weinstein said he was aware of some aspects of his brother’s behavior.

“I’ll tell you what I did know,” he told the Reporter. “Harvey was a bully, Harvey was arrogant, he treated people like shit all the time. That I knew. And I had to clean up for so many of his employee messes. People that came in crying to my office: ‘Your brother said this, that and the other.’ And I’d feel sick about it.”

Weinstein also said he was a victim of his brother’s abuse, including physical abuse.

“I do not put myself in the category at all of those women that he hurt,” he said. “But it’s a complicated situation when it’s your brother doing the abusing to you as well. I saw it and I asked him to get help for many years. And that’s the truth. He avoided getting the help. We begged him.

“This hurts, but I don’t feel an ounce of remorse coming from him, and that kills me too. When I heard his written, lame excuse … Not an excuse. When I heard his admission of feeling remorse for the victims and then him cavalierly, almost crazily saying he was going to go out and take on the NRA [National Rifle Association], it was so disturbing to me. It was utter insanity.

“My daughters all felt sick hearing this because we understood he felt nothing. I don’t feel he feels anything to this day. I don’t.”

Bob Weinstein denied leaking information that contributed to the New York Times report that launched the scandal: “I didn’t and, you know, Harvey is suspicious of everybody. It’s unbelievable that even to this moment he is more concerned with who sold him out.”

Weinstein said his brother should never be allowed back into the film industry.

“He lost his rights,” he said. “He didn’t lose his rights to be rehabilitated as a human being. But as far as being in this town again? I mean, give me a break.”