Harvey Weinstein: Court Overturns 2020 Sex Crimes Conviction

The New York Court of Appeals overturned Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 conviction for sex crimes. The conviction of the Hollywood producer had in previous years become a symbol of the MeToo movement in the United States.

As the New York Times reports, in a 4-3 decision, the New York Court of Appeals found that the judge presiding over Weinstein’s case had made a critical error by allowing prosecutors to call as witnesses a series of women who said Weinstein had assaulted them – but whose charges were not part of the official indictment.

According to the ruling, this means that the defendant was tried on the basis of his past conduct and not solely on the basis of the crimes he is accused of. In this context, it is now up to Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg to decide whether to request a retrial for Weinstein.

In total, he has been accused of sexual harassment against more than 100 women, and in New York he was convicted of assaulting two of them.

He is not released

The Court of Appeals decision does not mean that Weinstein, who is being held in a prison in upstate New York, will be released. In 2022, the 71-year-old was sentenced to 16 years in prison in California for raping a woman in a Beverly Hills hotel. He will now be sent to California to continue serving his sentence, according to a spokesman.

The history of complaints

The first reports against Weinstein were published in the New York Times in the fall of 2017. The stories that were presented sparked what later became known as the MeToo movement.

In 2018, Mr. Weinstein was indicted by a Manhattan grand jury. During the trial, which began in January 2020, he faced three counts of sexual assault and one count of rape.

The accusations were based mostly on complaints from two women: Miriam Haley, in a 2006 case, and Jessica Mann, who alleged Weinstein raped her in 2013.

In February 2020, a jury convicted Mr. Weinstein of two counts of rape and sexual assault. At the time, the producer was sentenced for the case to 23 years in prison.

During the trial, the judge had allowed four more women to testify that Mr. Wanstein had assaulted them. In successive appeals, attorneys for the producer argued that those individuals should not have been allowed to testify.