For greater than a month, witnesses gave graphic testimony of how former movie producer Harvey Weinstein would lure girls to personal conferences in resort rooms that shortly turned violent.

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For greater than a month, witnesses gave graphic testimony of how former movie producer Harvey Weinstein would lure girls to personal conferences in resort rooms that shortly turned violent.

Etienne Laurent-Pool/Getty Images

Harvey Weinstein, as soon as one of the vital highly effective males in Hollywood whose many intercourse crimes helped ignite the #metoo motion, was convicted of three of seven expenses in his second intercourse crimes trial, this time in Los Angeles. The jury was unable to achieve a verdict was on 3 of the fees. The 70-year-old is already serving a 23-year jail sentence for rape and sexual assault in New York.

Weinstein was charged with seven counts of raping and sexually assaulting 4 girls from 2004 to 2013: a mannequin, a dancer, a therapeutic massage therapist and a producer. He was originally charged with four more charges, however these have been dismissed when prosecutors mentioned they have been “unable to proceed” on the allegations made by a girl recognized as Jane Doe 5.

‘Casting sofa tradition’ as protection

During the trial, Deputy District Attorney Paul Thompson described Weinstein as a “predator,” a “monster,” a once-domineering media mogul on the high of his recreation, who used his prominence within the movie trade to coerce aspiring younger girls into non-public conferences that shortly turned violent. For greater than a month in courtroom, eight former fashions and actors vividly described Weinstein attacking them in varied resort rooms.

A normal view of Clara Shortridge Foltz Criminal Justice Center for Weinstein’s trial in Los Angeles.

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“In 2005, who would have thought that the most powerful man in Hollywood was a closet rapist?” requested Deputy District Attorney Marlene Martinez throughout closing arguments. “We know the despicable behavior the defendant engaged in. He thought he was so powerful that people would excuse his behavior. That’s just Harvey being Harvey. That’s just Hollywood. And for so long that’s what everyone did. Everyone just turned their heads.”

She projected pictures of wolves and bear traps representing Weinstein and added, “It is time for the kingmaker to be brought to justice.”

Weinstein denied all wrongdoing and didn’t testify throughout the trial. His attorneys referred to as no less than certainly one of his accusers a “bimbo,” and claimed the ladies had agreed to “transactional sex” with Weinstein with the intention to advance their careers in Hollywood. “In Hollywood, sex was a commodity,” Weinstein’s lawyer, Mark Werksman informed the jury, saying Weinstein’s actions have been a part of a “casting couch culture.”

Weinstein’s protection tried to discredit the ladies’s testimonies as “untrustworthy,” and through closing arguments, lawyer Alan Jackson referred to them as “fame and fortune seekers.”

Jackson informed jurors to look previous the emotional testimonies. “Tears,” he mentioned, “do not make truth.”

Four accusers testified

One of Weinstein’s accusers was Jennifer Siebel Newsom, the spouse of California Governor Gavin Newsom. During the trial, she tearfully informed jurors about what she referred to as her “nightmarish” encounters with him almost 20 years in the past, when she was an aspiring actress and filmmaker. Newsom testified that Weinstein invited her to satisfy to debate her profession at a resort in Beverly Hills. She graphically described how he shoved her onto a mattress and raped her.

Jennifer Siebel Newsom testifying in Los Angeles.

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After the decision got here down Jennifer Newsom launched an announcement saying “Harvey Weinstein will never be able to rape another woman. He will spend the rest of his life behind bars where he belongs. Harvey Weinstein is a serial predator and what he did was rape.

“Throughout the trial, Weinstein’s lawyers used sexism, misogyny, and bullying tactics to intimidate, demean, and ridicule us survivors. This trial was a stark reminder that we as a society have work to do. To all survivors out there — I see you, I hear you, and I stand with you.”

Other girls recognized as “Jane Doe” included a licensed therapeutic massage therapist actress and mannequin Natassia Malthe, who detailed an alleged assault inside a London resort.

The accusers additionally described “abnormalities” on Weinstein’s genitalia, “the result of a surgery the defendant had in 1999 that caused noticeable scarring,” in accordance with prosecutors.

Italian mannequin Ambra Battilana Gutierrez was a witness throughout the trial, testifying about his “prior bad acts.” In 2015, she filed a police report that spurred intercourse crimes prosecutors to research Weinstein. Gutierrez was a part of a sting operation for the New York Police Department; she agreed to put on a wire to report Weinstein. The Manhattan district lawyer on the time did not find yourself prosecuting him, however the recording was performed for jurors in Los Angeles.

Two years after Gutierrez’s unique police report, a number of allegations in opposition to Weinstein went public, with investigative reporting by The New York Times and The New Yorker. More than 100 girls got here ahead with harrowing accounts concerning the movie government.

The information ignited the #MeToo movement, which drew attention to sexual abuse and sexual harassment in the workplace, not simply in Hollywood, however in all of society. That motion has uncovered sexual misconduct by very highly effective males in enterprise, politics and leisure.

What’s subsequent for Weinstein?

Weinstein’s authorized bother is much from over.

In London, he faces felony expenses of indecent assault of a girl in 1996. His attorneys are actually interesting his New York verdict, so his Los Angeles conviction may imply he stays behind bars for the remainder of his life.