By MICHAEL R. SISAK
NEW YORK (AP) — Harvey Weinstein ‘s #MeToo retrial next month will largely be an abridged version of the original, with one big addition: a charge based on an allegation from a woman who wasn’t part of the primary case.
Simply how the reprise of the disgraced film mogul’s prosecution performs out is coming into focus at a listening to Wednesday, the place a decide is about to challenge rulings on a wide range of points, together with the scope of accuser testimony and potential professional witnesses.
Weinstein, 72, was in courtroom for the listening to, which began greater than a hour late after Choose Curtis Farber met with the prosecution and protection behind closed doorways to debate issues nonetheless underneath seal.
These included a prosecution request that two of the three accusers within the case be allowed to testify about different alleged encounters with Weinstein. In addition they mentioned proof of the accusers’ sexual historical past, which prosecutors say needs to be barred underneath New York’s Rape Protect Legislation.
Weinstein’s retrial is scheduled to begin April 15 in state courtroom in Manhattan — practically a 12 months after New York’s highest courtroom overturned his 2020 conviction on rape and sexual assault prices.
At his final courtroom look, in January, Weinstein implored Farber to begin the retrial sooner. He instructed the decide “I don’t know how much longer I can hold on” with most cancers, coronary heart points and harsh situations at New York Metropolis’s Rikers Island jail complicated, the place he’s locked up.
Weinstein arrived to courtroom Wednesday in a wheelchair, carrying a go well with and holding a stack of paperwork. Earlier than his listening to started, the ex-studio boss watched from behind the protection desk as Farber spent a couple of minutes resolving one other matter that had been delayed by their closed-door discussions.
Weinstein is being retried on prices that he forcibly carried out oral intercourse on a film and TV manufacturing assistant in 2006 and raped an aspiring actor in 2013. The extra cost, filed final September, alleges he compelled oral intercourse on a special girl at a Manhattan lodge in 2006.
Manhattan District Legal professional Alvin Bragg’s workplace stated in courtroom papers that the girl, who has not been recognized publicly, got here ahead to prosecutors simply days earlier than the beginning of Weinstein’s first trial however was not a part of that case.
Prosecutors stated they didn’t pursue the ladies’s allegations after Weinstein was convicted and sentenced to 23 years in jail, however they revisited them and secured a brand new indictment after the state’s Court docket of Appeals threw out his conviction final April.
Farber dominated in October to mix the brand new indictment and present prices into one trial.
Weinstein’s legal professionals contend that prosecutors prejudiced him by ready practically 5 years to deliver the extra cost, suggesting that they had elected to not embody the allegation in his first trial so they may use it later if his conviction had been reversed.
Weinstein has denied that he raped or sexually assaulted anybody.
Final month, Weinstein added Jennifer Bonjean, a lawyer who has represented Invoice Cosby and R. Kelly, to a authorized staff that features protection attorneys Arthur Aidala, Diana Fabi Samson and former decide Barry Kamins.
In vacating Weinstein’s conviction, the Court docket of Appeals dominated that the trial decide, James M. Burke, unfairly allowed testimony towards him primarily based on allegations from different girls that weren’t a part of the case. Burke is now not on the bench and such testimony received’t be a part of the retrial.
Weinstein was convicted in Los Angeles in 2022 of one other rape. His 16-year jail sentence in that case nonetheless stands, however his legal professionals appealed in June, arguing he didn’t get a good trial.
