Weinstein Is ‘Serial Predator,’ and Innocent, Jury Told in Turn
Weinstein Assaulted Women, Used Power to Cover It Up, State Says
(Bloomberg) -- Harvey Weinstein was two people -- one public, one private -- the first witness in his rape trial said, after opening statements in which a prosecutor described Weinstein as a “serial sexual predator” and the defense said that any sex was consensual and that the claims against him were a “mirage.”
“I would say his public persona was diametrically opposed to who he was as a person,” Lance Maerov testified for the Manhattan district attorney’s office on Wednesday.
Maerov, who told the court he was appointed lead outside director at Weinstein Co. in March of 2013, said Weinstein could be both charming and volatile, calling him “litigious” and adding that he once threatened to sue Maerov.
Weinstein, 67, was once among the most powerful producers in the film industry, influencing American politics and culture. Maerov testified that his success and the number of famous people’s names he dropped, including those of Bill and Hillary Clinton, enhanced his aura.
Now Weinstein will spend weeks listening as prosecutors argue he wielded his clout to assault women and get away with it. He arrived at court on Wednesday assisted by a member of his defense team but for the first time without the walker he has used since jury selection began on Jan. 6.
More than two years after the publication of explosive allegations that launched the #MeToo movement, the New York criminal trial could send Weinstein to prison for the rest of his life. Whatever the outcome, it marks an extraordinary moment in society’s reckoning with decades of abuse and assault of women in entertainment and across industries -- though New York State Supreme Court Justice James Burke has cautioned the jury that the trial “is not a referendum” on #MeToo.
The day began with opening arguments, first from the state.
Addressing a jury of seven men and five women in the hushed lower Manhattan courtroom, Assistant District Attorney Meghan Hast tore into Weinstein -- now reduced from industry colossus to “the defendant” -- as more than 100 spectators and journalists looked on. Hast told the jurors that he assaulted two women and used his power to cover it up, calling him “a serial sexual predator.”
“During this trial, you are going to learn that the defendant was a savvy New York businessman, that he was a famous and powerful Hollywood producer, living a life of luxury that most of us will never know,” Hast said as she used an oversize TV screen to display a photo of the Oscar winner in a tuxedo at a glamorous event.
“At the end of this trial,” she told the jury, “the evidence will be clear that this man, seated at this table, was not only a titan in Hollywood but a rapist who assaulted women who refused to comply with his orders and used his power and prestige in the entertainment industry to ensure their silence.”
Hast was followed by defense attorney Damon Cheronis.
“What you’re going to see, the evidence from these witnesses, is that that’s not true, he wasn’t this master manipulator,” Cheronis told the panel. He said the defense would show through the women’s own testimony that the case is a “mirage” and that their accounts are undercut by messages at least two of them sent to Weinstein that included expressions of “affection” for him.
“At some point you’re going to say, ‘Oh my God, Harvey Weinstein is innocent!” he told the jurors, calling the prosecution’s opening argument “a preview to a movie you won’t see.”
Then came Maerov. Assistant District Attorney Joan Illuzzi asked him whether Weinstein’s control over the company changed after his appointment as lead outside director.
“Does that mean that Harvey Weinstein had to get your approval for actions he wanted to take inside the company, like expenditures?” Illuzzi asked.
“I would say of the many boards I have sat on, this had the weakest governance and wasn’t investor-friendly,” Maerov said.
Weinstein is on trial for attacking two women, but prosecutors, seeking to demonstrate a pattern of “prior bad acts,” say they will offer testimony from other women as well. He faces five criminal counts, including rape and predatory sexual assault.
The jurors -- six white men, an African-American man, three African-American women and two white women -- will decide whether Weinstein is guilty of raping a woman in a Manhattan hotel room in 2013 and performing a forcible sex act on another in 2006 in his apartment in the city.
More than 80 women have accused Weinstein of harassing, abusing or assaulting them, including the actors Rose McGowan and Annabella Sciorra. Sciorra’s lawyer, Gloria Allred, has said her client is going to testify at the trial to support the prosecution’s case.
On Wednesday, Allred was seated in the front row, behind the prosecution table, along with Douglas Wigdor, a lawyer for two women who have accused Weinstein of sexually assaulting them. Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. was in the row behind them. Weinstein sat at the defense table with half a dozen lawyers.
At least 200 people lined up in the early-morning January chill to get a place in the courtroom, which seats just over 100. Among them were a number of young women who work in the district attorney’s office and a law student there to observe the proceedings.
Journalists from around the world were in attendance, from major media to less prominent outlets. Among those queued up on the press line was Cheslie Kryst for Extra, a lawyer herself, as well as Miss USA 2019.
The case is People v. Weinstein, 450293/2018, New York State Supreme Court (Manhattan).
--With assistance from Olivia Rockeman.
To contact the reporter on this story: Patricia Hurtado in Federal Court in Manhattan at pathurtado@bloomberg.net
To contact the editors responsible for this story: David Glovin at dglovin@bloomberg.net, Peter Jeffrey, Steve Stroth
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