Harvey Weinstein ’s attorneys obtained their flip Thursday to query a lady who alleges the one-time Hollywood heavyweight held her down and compelled oral intercourse on her almost twenty years in the past.
Miriam Haley, testifying for a 3rd day at Weinstein’s rape retrial, was grilled about particulars of her recollections — akin to precisely how she as soon as propped open an condo constructing door — and the larger image of her story.
Protection lawyer Jennifer Bonjean underscored that Haley, who was then searching for leisure manufacturing work, stayed in contact with Weinstein regardless of feeling humiliated when he complimented her legs and requested for a therapeutic massage at a gathering a number of months earlier than the alleged 2006 assault.
“You understood these were sexual overtures?” Bonjean requested.
Haley mentioned she did.
“You rebuffed them, and he still gave you his phone number, right?”
“Yes,” mentioned Haley, who obtained a brief gig on the Weinstein-produced “Project Runway” shortly after that assembly, which occurred in his firm’s resort suite in the course of the 2006 Cannes Movie Pageant.
Haley has repeatedly testified that she was pursuing solely job alternatives, nothing else, from Weinstein.
Bonjean additionally sparred with the witness over her choice to get a lawyer and maintain a press convention airing her allegations because the #MeToo motion exploded in October 2017, fueled by different ladies’s claims that the Oscar-winning producer had sexually assaulted or harassed them.
Weinstein, 73, has pleaded not responsible and denies sexually assaulting anybody. His attorneys argue that every one of his accusers consented to sexual encounters in hopes of getting work in present enterprise.
NBC 4’s Erica Byfield stories on the most recent testimonies for the Harvey Weinstein rape trial from Decrease Manhattan.
Haley, who has additionally passed by the title Mimi Haleyi, is the primary of three accusers anticipated to testify on the retrial. She is reprising and including some new particulars to testimony that led to Weinstein’s since-overturned 2020 conviction.
She testified Wednesday that Weinstein assaulted her after inviting her to his condo for what she anticipated to be a pleasant, skilled assembly. She mentioned he pushed her onto a mattress, ignoring her pleas of: “No, no — it’s not going to happen.”
She and two mates testified that she advised them quickly after that Weinstein had sexually assaulted her.
Haley testified that she took a prearranged flight to Los Angeles on Weinstein’s dime the following day, and some weeks later agreed to fulfill him at a Manhattan resort. She mentioned she had anticipated to speak within the foyer, however was as a substitute directed to his room, the place she says she had undesirable, however not compelled, intercourse with him.
Bonjean identified Thursday that when Haley went public in 2017, she didn’t point out her subsequent sexual encounter with Weinstein, nor their continued contact.
“You told the press only part of the story, correct?” Bonjean requested.
“I told the part that was relevant to what I was trying to share,” Haley mentioned.
She denied Bonjean’s suggestion that she spoke out in hopes of suing Weinstein, although she later sued and obtained a roughly $475,000 settlement.
Issues obtained testy between a witness and the protection within the Harvey Weinstein rape retrial in New York Metropolis, as a roommate of an accuser obtained into it with Weinstein’s legal professional. NBC New York’s Erica Byfield stories.
Specializing in the Cannes assembly, Bonjean pressed Haley on what to make of the truth that she had secured a gathering with a prime producer whereas she had restricted expertise herself.
“So, as somebody in my position, I should have turned it down, is what you’re saying?” Haley shot again.
“I’m not saying you should have done anything,” Bonjean replied.
She is going to step away from Weinstein’s protection workforce to attend to a different trial after she finishes questioning Haley, who’s due again on the stand Friday.
Weinstein’s retrial contains fees associated to Haley and one other accuser from the unique trial, Jessica Mann, who alleges Weinstein raped her in 2013. He’s additionally being tried, for the primary time, for allegedly forcing oral intercourse on former mannequin Kaja Sokola in 2006.
Mann and Sokola are also anticipated to testify.
The Related Press typically doesn’t title individuals who allege they have been sexually assaulted until they offer permission for his or her names for use. Haley, Mann and Sokola have carried out so.
