LOS ANGELES: Already in prison as a convicted rapist, the former influential film mogul Harvey Weinstein finds himself in further trouble as new accounts of sexual assaults emerge from Los Angeles on Friday.
Jackie Lacey, the LA county district attorney states that Weinstein is alleged with three more rape felonies and three forced oral copulation crimes occurring between 2004 and 2010 in Beverly Hills. Along with the prior five convictions, the total count of his sexual offenses now reach up to eleven in the county.
One of the alleged rape incidents took place between 2004 and 2005 against a woman in a Beverly Hills hotel and the two other alleged rape incidents were committed against a woman on separate occasions between 2009 and 2010 in Beverly Hills hotels, prosecutors said.
In March, Weinstein was sentenced to 23 years in prison in Manhattan, New York following a widely-observed and famous trial. He was found guilty for a first-degree sexual offense act against a woman and a third-degree rape charge against another woman.
Earlier in January, while still facing the trial, Weinstein was charged in LA with the sexual assault of two women in 2013. Another charge of sexual assault against a woman in a Beverly Hills hotel in May 2010 was added in April later.
In the follow-up of new cases, extradition proceedings will most likely occur in New York with a hearing scheduled for December 11 in Buffalo. If convicted fully, his sentence may rise up to 140 years in California prison, the district attorney said.
Several allegations of sexual harassment initially surfaced against Weinstein in 2017 as many celebrities came forward publically to give their testimonies. The popularity of Weinstein’s case was even more stirred up due to the resultant #Me Too Movement of significant magnitude on the internet. As a result, a criminal investigation was launched in New York which charged him in May 2018.
Weinstein responded to the allegations with an apology but still maintained his defense on the charges.
Currently, his spokesperson, Juda Engelmayer, has defended him saying, “Harvey Weinstein has always maintained that every one of his physical encounters throughout his entire life have been consensual. That hasn’t changed.” However, Engelmayer has refused to comment on the new charges yet.
Twenty-one women, the ‘Silence Breakers’, who have come out against Weinstein issued a stated on Friday in regards to the recent developments saying that they are “gratified to see the wheels of justice continuing to turn in Los Angeles.”
