Harvey Weinstein begged a choose Wednesday to carry his retrial on intercourse crimes as quickly as attainable, telling him “I do not understand how for much longer I can maintain on” with most cancers, coronary heart points and harsh circumstances at New York Metropolis’s Rikers Island jail complicated.
The disgraced film mogul objected after Choose Curtis Farber stated the retrial would begin April 15, imploring him to swap with one other, unrelated trial the choose has in March.
“Every single day I am at Rikers Island, it is a thriller to me how I am nonetheless strolling,” Weinstein stated at a listening to in state court docket in Manhattan.
“I am holding on as a result of I need justice for myself and I need this to be over with,” he stated.
Weinstein, 72, is being handled for quite a few well being circumstances, together with persistent myeloid leukemia, coronary heart points and diabetes. He complained to Farber that jail officers gave him the fallacious tablets Wednesday morning and failed to select him up for court docket in a well timed style.
“So many individuals are struggling on Rikers Island,” he stated.
Weinstein arrived in court docket in a wheelchair greater than a half-hour after the listening to’s scheduled begin time. At occasions, as he addressed Farber, he sounded extra just like the imperious studio boss he as soon as was.
“I am asking and begging you, your honour, to maneuver your trial,” Weinstein stated, suggesting that even every week’s head begin could be useful.
Weinstein stated he typically finds himself gasping for air and predicted that he would quickly be in a hospital once more for remedy.
He quizzed the choose about his trial calendar, together with jury choice in one other matter that’s set to start Monday. Farber stated he arrived on the April 15 date after consulting with prosecutors and Weinstein’s legal professionals however would look into probably beginning the trial a number of days earlier, if time permits.
“I am in a critical emergency state of affairs. I’m begging the court docket to maneuver your date,” Weinstein stated, telling the choose he needed to “get out of this hellhole as rapidly as attainable.”
Weinstein’s entreaty, a rarity for a prison defendant, got here after Farber issued a key ruling defining the scope of his retrial. The choose upheld a cost based mostly on an allegation from a lady who wasn’t within the authentic case.
Weinstein had needed the additional cost thrown out, arguing by his legal professionals that the Manhattan district legal professional’s workplace solely introduced it to bolster their case with a 3rd accuser after New York’s highest court docket overturned his 2020 conviction on rape and sexual assault costs involving two girls.
New York’s highest court docket has overturned Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 conviction for sexual assault and rape, a landmark ruling of the #MeToo motion. Andrew Chang explains how the prosecution knew it was taking a bet, and the place that gamble went fallacious.
Scheduling the retrial was difficult by an more and more crowded court docket calendar.
Weinstein’s lawyer, Arthur Aidala, is representing conservative strategist Steve Bannon in a border wall fraud trial set to start out March 4 earlier than a unique Manhattan choose.
In the meantime, Farber has a homicide trial in March.
Earlier than Bannon’s trial date was set final week, Aidala had prompt that Weinstein’s trial go first in “the curiosity of humanity,” citing the ex-studio boss’ declining well being.
“They know that Mr. Weinstein is dying of most cancers and is an harmless man proper now within the state of New York,” Aidala argued in court docket final week. He pleaded to prosecutors: “Can I do that dying man’s case first?”
Weinstein is being retried on costs 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 pressured oral intercourse on a unique girl at a Manhattan resort in 2006.
The Manhattan district legal professional’s workplace stated in court docket papers that the lady, 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 Courtroom of Appeals threw out his conviction final April.
Farber dominated in October to mix the brand new indictment and current costs into one trial.
Weinstein’s legal professionals contend that prosecutors prejudiced him by ready almost 5 years to carry 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.
Prosecutors referred to as that considering “absurd,” countering that Weinstein’s legal professionals would have additionally been outraged if he had been charged based mostly on the third girl’s allegation both throughout his first trial or instantly after his conviction.
Weinstein “would seemingly have characterised that timing as a vindictive and gratuitous pile-on,” prosecutors wrote in a court docket submitting final month.
#MeToo motion
Manhattan District Legal professional Alvin Bragg’s workplace stated the beforehand uncharged allegation “required a delicate investigation” and critical contemplation earlier than in search of an indictment, partially as a result of there are not any eyewitnesses to the alleged assault and no scientific or different bodily proof.
Weinstein co-founded the movie and tv manufacturing corporations Miramax and The Weinstein Firm, and was as soon as one of the vital highly effective individuals in Hollywood, having produced movies reminiscent of Pulp Fiction and The Crying Sport.
In 2017, he grew to become probably the most outstanding determine of the #MeToo motion, which erupted when girls started going public with accounts of his behaviour.
He has lengthy maintained that any sexual exercise was consensual.
New Yorkers stated they had been nervous and disenchanted, when requested about movie producer Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 rape conviction being overturned by New York’s highest court docket.
In vacating Weinstein’s conviction, the Courtroom of Appeals dominated that the trial choose, James M. Burke, unfairly allowed testimony towards him based mostly on allegations from different girls that weren’t a part of the case. Burke is now not on the bench.
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.
Weinstein has remained in custody in New York’s Rikers Island jail complicated, with occasional journeys to a hospital for medical remedy, whereas awaiting the retrial.
The Related Press doesn’t usually establish individuals alleging sexual assault except they consent to be named.
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