Harvey Weinstein, once again denying that he ever raped anyone, could be ending his battles with New York prosecutors.
Failing to get a criminal conviction tossed and again complaining about the conditions at Rikers Island, Weinstein wants to begin negotiations with Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg‘s office ahead of his upcoming trial, his lawyer said during a hearing Thursday.
“Your honor, I did have the chance to speak with Mr. Weinstein, and I would like to pursue plea negotiations,” longtime Weinstein defense lawyer Arthur Aidala told Judge Curtis Faber and a sparsely attended Manhattan courtroom today. Once against any such deal, Aidala Thursday added that “my client wants additional time to think about it.” The attorney’s remarks came after a brief break in proceedings, with Aidala and a wheelchair-bound Weinstein outside the courtroom.
As it stands, Faber gave once mini-mogul Weinstein and his team two weeks to confirm or reject plea talks with prosecutors. Another hearing is scheduled for February 25 on various motions in the sex case that is before the court and heading to trial.
Today, Weinstein gave the court his now standard line about the dozens of rape, sexual assault and retaliation claims against him since the New York Times’ 2017 exposé on the Miramax co-founder’s decades of abuse of women and power. “I know I was unfaithful, I know I acted wrongly, but I never assaulted anyone,” he said, even as the plea deal prospect entered the conversation. “Your Honor, I’m begging for a second chance,” Weinstein went on to say, stating he was “disappointed in today’s decision.”
The shift in tactics for the 73-year-old and openly ailing Pulp Fiction producer, who has spent almost six years in prison already, came as Faber set a March 3 trial start date for charges that Weinstein raped actress Jessica Mann in 2013. It would be the third NYC rape trial for Weinstein, who was also found guilty of sex crimes in a Los Angeles trial in 2022.
A New York state appeal court threw out Weinstein’s 2020 sex crimes conviction in April 2024. Weinstein had been sentenced to 23 years in a state prison after that 2020 trial. Despite the 2020 case being tossed, Weinstein has remained behind bars due to his West Coast conviction as a new trial came together.
That second Big Apple trial ended in June 2025 with a mixed verdict, with the seven-woman, five-man jury finding Weinstein guilty of a first-degree criminal sexual act against Miriam Haley and not guilty of the same act against Kaja Sokola. A mistrial was declared over the jurors’ inability to reach a decision on a charge of third-degree rape involving Mann, leading to the latest trial.
Faber was unequivocal Thursday in waving off Weinstein’s contention that two of the jurors were leaned on to convict him on Haley charges. “The Court’s response to the jurors’ complaints appropriately balanced the competing interests of investigating the allegations while avoiding any unnecessary taint of the deliberating jury,” he wrote in a 25-page order and decision.
Getting specific, Faber added: “While defendant frames Juror 7’s description of overhearing two jurors talking to each other outside of the jury room about their “belief” that another juror had been bribed by defendant as ‘misconduct’ and ‘bias’ (DM at 19), overhearing a baseless accusation does not constitute the kind of outside influence or racial or ethnic bias that falls within the narrow exceptions of the no impeachment rule. Rather, it smacks of a childish and unsupported accusation, in the vein of name calling, that arose from a tense first day of deliberations after a grueling two month trial.”
Contacted by Deadline, the Manhattan DA’s office declined comment on potential plea talks. Weinstein’s own reps had no comment on today’s events.