What’s Next for Harvey Weinstein After His New York Rape Conviction Was Overturned?
When New York’s top court overturned Harvey Weinstein’s Manhattan-based sex crimes conviction in a surprise move Thursday, questions about Weinstein’s reversal of fortune and what comes next for the disgraced movie mogul started to multiply.
Will there be a new trial in New York? Could Weinstein be released on bail while that question plays out? Is Weinstein’s subsequent conviction in California in jeopardy now too?
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A spokesperson for Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg quickly signaled Thursday that the office hoped to put Weinstein back in front of a jury. “We will do everything in our power to retry this case and remain steadfast in our commitment to survivors of sexual assault,” the spokesperson said. One of the two victims in the original trial, Miriam “Mimi” Haley, said Friday she would consider testifying again.
Asked by Rolling Stone how she was feeling about possibly going back on the stand, Haley expressed concern about “rehashing and reliving” what she has described as a violent assault in 2006. In her prior testimony, she told jurors Weinstein pushed her onto a bed, held her down and forcibly performed a sex act on her.
“It was re-traumatizing and grueling and exhausting and all the things,” she said of her testimony during the initial trial. “I definitely don’t want to go through that again, but for the sake of, you know, keeping going and doing the right thing – and because it is what happened – I would consider it.”
The Manhattan jurors who first put Weinstein in prison levied their conviction in February 2020. They found that he sexually assaulted Haley in 2006 and also raped aspiring actress Jessica Mann in 2013. The appeals court ruling that overturned the conviction wasn’t tied to Haley or Mann; rather, it found that the trial court allowed too much evidence about alleged “prior bad acts.” It also determined Weinstein was unfairly dissuaded from testifying due to the threat of cross-examination on the uncharged acts.
In a dissent to the appellate court’s divided 4-3 decision, Judge Anthony Cannataro wrote that the three additional “bad acts” witnesses, known in New York as Molineux witnesses, were necessary to show Weinstein’s pattern of “manipulation and intimidation” and rebut his claim the encounters were consensual.
If Bragg’s office moves to retry Weinstein, Haley’s testimony would be crucial. His conviction on the first-degree count related to Haley accounted for 20 years in his 23-year sentence. “I commend Mimi on her courage and willingness to keep standing up for the truth,” her lawyer, Gloria Allred, said Thursday. Allred said she and her clients, which include several other Weinstein survivors, “will continue to fight for justice for victims both in criminal and civil cases until there is a fair trial not just for the accused but also for those who allege that they are victims of sexual predators.” At a press conference held with Haley on Friday, Allred called on New York legislators to pass a law that would more clearly define the rights of victims of sex crimes in particular to introduce evidence of an alleged assailant’s prior bad acts.
As of Friday, it was unclear how much longer Weinstein might remain in New York custody, but there was no chance he would be released on bail. Though Weinstein is now free of the 23-year sentence he received in Manhattan, he’s still serving a 16-year sentence for his 2022 conviction on one count of rape and two counts of sexual assault in California. In that case, a Los Angeles jury convicted Weinstein for his attack on Italian actress Evgeniya Chernyshova in a southern California hotel room in 2013. If New York prosecutors decide not to stage another trial against Weinstein, he will remain in custody pending extradition to California.
Weinstein, meanwhile, is appealing his California conviction as well with his brief due to be filed with the state’s 2nd Appellate District next month. His Los Angeles trial lawyer, Mark Werksman, tells Rolling Stone that the New York opinion released Thursday shows Weinstein’s California conviction is vulnerable too.
“The California conviction suffers from the same fatal flaw and unfairness as the New York case, which is that the jury was allowed to hear about too many uncharged and uncorroborated allegations, and consequently, Harvey was denied a fair trial,” Werksman says.
But Chernyshova’s attorney, David Ring, disagrees. “We feel highly, highly confident that California is going to upheld the criminal conviction against Harvey Weinstein and that he’ll serve his 16-year sentence in California. The New York trial was markedly different,” Ring tells Rolling Stone. “New York has different laws than California does. California has a specific evidence code that allows other victims of sexual assault to testify in criminal cases. New York does not have that particular statute.” And the Los Angeles County judge on the trial “kept a very tight reign” on what was allowed, he said.
In the case of Weinstein’s California trial, prosecutors initially sought to include so-called “propensity” evidence from 16 women who levied allegations against the disgraced movie mogul beyond the underlying charges in the California case. This group included actors Daryl Hannah and Rose McGowan. Judge Lisa B. Lench ruled that prosecutors could bring in only six, and that number was whittled down further at trial.
Beyond his criminal convictions, Weinstein is also facing ongoing civil litigation, including a lawsuit filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court by Chernyshova. That case is in a holding pattern amid Weinstein’s appeal and the decision Thursday.
Another high-profile lawsuit from actor Julia Ormond was filed against Weinstein last year. The complaint, filed in New York, alleges Weinstein sexually assaulted Ormond in 1995, and that her talent agency CAA and studio owner Disney enabled the abuse. The case, which Ormond filed with high-powered victim’s attorney Douglas H. Wigdor, is ongoing. A hearing on dismissal motions from Disney and CAA is set for May 20.
“Today’s decision is a major step back in holding those accountable for acts of sexual violence,” Wigdor, who represents eight Weinstein victims, including two of the Molineux witnesses at the New York criminal trial, said in a statement Thursday. “Courts routinely admit evidence of other uncharged acts where they assist juries in understanding issues concerning the intent, modus operandi or scheme of the defendant. The jury was instructed on the relevance of this testimony and overturning the verdict is tragic in that it will require the victims to endure yet another trial.”
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