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Agnifilo and his partners took on the case only in February, when longtime Weinstein lawyer Arthur Aidala stepped aside from the retrial to focus on the former studio boss\u2019s appeals and civil matters. Both Aidala and Agnifilo are well-known New York defense attorneys, but their litigation styles differ. Aidala is folksy, while Agnifilo is more buttoned-up.<\/p>\n
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Weinstein wielded significant clout in the entertainment industry, having built his reputation on such critical and popular hits as \u201cShakespeare in Love,\u201d \u201cPulp Fiction\u201d and \u201cChocolat.\u201d He also became a prominent Democratic donor.<\/p>\n
Then a series of sexual harassment and sex assault allegations against Weinstein began to emerge in news media in 2017, propelling the #MeToo movement.<\/p>\n
He was criminally charged in New York in 2018 and in Los Angeles two years later.<\/p>\n
Weinstein went to trial and was convicted of some \u2014 but not all \u2014 counts in both cases. His initial New York convictions were overturned, spurring a retrial last year.<\/p>\n
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The retrial verdict was mixed: Weinstein was convicted of forcing oral sex on production assistant and producer Miriam Haley in 2006, but he was acquitted of forcibly performing oral sex that same year on model-turned-psychotherapist Kaja Sokola. The jury didn\u2019t decide on the rape charge involving Mann because the foreperson refused to keep deliberating.<\/p>\n
Weinstein subsequently considered pleading guilty, according to Aidala. Evidently, Weinstein ultimately rejected the idea.<\/p>\n
Mann has testified that she had a consensual, on-and-off relationship with the then-married Weinstein. But when he cornered her in a Manhattan hotel room where she was staying on a weekend getaway, she protested, \u201cI don\u2019t want to do this,\u201d she told jurors. She said he kept making advances and demands until she \u201cjust gave up.\u201d<\/p>\n
Weinstein hasn\u2019t testified at any of his trials, but his lawyers have contended that he never had non-consensual sex.<\/p>\n
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The defense claimed that Mann and his other accusers willingly entertained his sexual overtures because they wanted his help with their show-business aspirations. The women, by contrast, said Weinstein dangled his Hollywood influence to draw them into his orbit and then victimize them.<\/p>\n
His sexual assault conviction involving Haley carries the potential for up to 25 years in prison; no sentencing date has been set. In this case, the yet-to-be-decided rape charge is a lower-level felony punishable by up to four years behind bars. Weinstein, 73, already has served longer than that.<\/p>\n
Weinstein suffers from various health problems and uses a wheelchair. He said in court in January that he’s haunted by the possibility that he might die in New York\u2019s notorious Rikers Island jail.<\/p>\n
\u201cMy mental state is collapsing. \u2026 My spirit is breaking,\u201d he told the judge.<\/p>\n
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Weinstein\u2019s lawyers have argued that his New York conviction last year was poisoned by bad blood among jurors. Meanwhile, he’s appealing the Los Angeles verdict.<\/p>\n
The Associated Press generally does not identify people without their permission if they say they have been sexually assaulted. Haley, Mann and Sokola agreed to be named.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Harvey Weinstein appears in court for a pre-trial hearing, Thursday, March 19, 2026, in New York. (Jefferson Siegel\/The…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":196409,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[39],"tags":[51375,78292,6431,78294,78293,40355,1016,75,31035,78291,9,24,63,833,834,2376,3065,2336,829,2337,831,2338,134,136,135],"class_list":{"0":"post-196408","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-staten-island","8":"tag-arthur-l-aidala","9":"tag-curtis-farber","10":"tag-harvey-weinstein","11":"tag-harvey-weinstein-rape-trial-metoo","12":"tag-jessica-mann","13":"tag-kaja-sokola","14":"tag-los-angeles","15":"tag-manhattan","16":"tag-marc-agnifilo","17":"tag-miriam-haley","18":"tag-new-york","19":"tag-new-york-city","20":"tag-nyc","21":"tag-package-100024-ap-online","22":"tag-package-100373-mc-complete-state-national","23":"tag-product-30031-ap-california-state-news-no-weather","24":"tag-product-30083-ap-new-york-city-news-no-weather","25":"tag-product-30085-ap-new-york-state-news-no-weather","26":"tag-product-30598-ap-national-news-report-a-wire","27":"tag-product-31388-premium-entertainment","28":"tag-product-31998-ap-online-national-news","29":"tag-product-33328-ap-premium-entertainment-other","30":"tag-staten-island","31":"tag-staten-island-headlines","32":"tag-staten-island-news"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196408","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=196408"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/196408\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/196409"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=196408"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=196408"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us-ny\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=196408"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}