NEW YORK — In a milestone for the #MeToo movement, disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein turned himself in to New York authorities Friday morning, and prosecutors filed criminal charges against him, including rape.
The New York Police Department said Weinstein was charged with rape, a criminal sex act, sex abuse and sexual misconduct for incidents involving two women, whose names are being withheld from the public.
“The NYPD thanks these brave survivors for their courage to come forward and seek justice,” the department said in a statement.
Weinstein was led into a courtroom with his hands cuffed behind his back. During a brief court appearance, he did not speak.
A judge set his bail at $10 million and restricted his movements to New York and Connecticut.
Weinstein consented to 24-hour-a-day GPS monitoring and a temporary restraining order for one victim.
Manhattan Asst. Dist. Atty. Joan Illuzzi said in court that Weinstein “used his position and power” to sexually exploit his victims. She described his actions as “two separate forcible sexual assaults against two separate women.”
The charges are the first to result from months of investigations in New York, California and London. Weinstein is expected to be charged with raping one woman and forcing another to perform oral sex, according to sources familiar with the investigation.
At least 100 reporters and photographers waited outside the New York Police Department’s 1st Precinct station in downtown Manhattan, all eyes trained on the building’s front door awaiting the surrender. Police set up barricades along the intersection of Varick and Beach streets, drawing bemused stares of passing motorists, who repeatedly rolled down their windows to ask what was happening.
Police blocked off traffic around 7:25 a.m. and Weinstein exited a truck that pulled up near the precint headquarters entrance. He was sporting a light blue sweater under a dark blazer and carrying two books — “Something Wonderful: Rodgers and Hammerstein’s Broadway Revolution” by Todd S. Purdum and “Elia Kazan” by Richard Schickel, a biography of the legendary director and former member of the Communist Party who named names of other party members during a wave of U.S. anti-communist hysteria.
Weinstein ignored a din of shouted questions from reporters.
Police said prisoner processing can take up to two hours. Sources with knowledge of the case said one of the charges will involve a once-aspiring actress who has alleged that Weinstein assaulted her during a meeting at his Miramax office in 2004. Lucia Evans told New Yorker magazine last year that Weinstein said during a meeting that she’d “be great in ‘Project Runway’” before allegedly forcing her to perform oral sex.
The second victim’s identity jhas not been confirmed. In that case, Weinstein was expected to be charged with first- and third-degree rape.
The producer has denied any wrongdoing.
“Mr. Weinstein has always maintained that he has never engaged in nonconsensual sexual acts,” his attorneys Blair Berk and Benjamin Brafman said in an earlier statement.
According to the New Yorker story, Evans said she met with Weinstein in one of his offices when she was a student at Middlebury College.
“He immediately was simultaneously flattering me and demeaning me and making me feel bad about myself,” she told the magazine. Weinstein told her that she’d be perfect for “Project Runway” — the show, which Weinstein helped produce, premiered later in 2004 — but that she needed to lose weight. She also said he told her about two scripts, a horror movie and a teen love story.
“At that point, after that, is when he assaulted me,” Evans said.
She said she had objected, but that Weinstein exposed his penis and pulled her head down toward it.
“I said, over and over, ‘I don’t want to do this, stop, don’t,’ ” Evans told the New Yorker. “I tried to get away, but maybe I didn’t try hard enough. I didn’t want to kick him or fight him.” In the end, she said, “he’s a big guy. He overpowered me.” She added: “I just sort of gave up. That’s the most horrible part of it, and that’s why he’s been able to do this for so long to so many women: People give up, and then they feel like it’s their fault.”
Weinstein has been accused by more than 80 women of misconduct that includes sexual harassment and rape. Police in Los Angeles, Beverly Hills, New York and London have conducted investigations into more than 20 allegations.
In Los Angeles, L.A. County Dist. Atty. Jackie Lacey’s team has been reviewing two investigations into Weinstein by Beverly Hills police, as well as three Los Angeles Police Department investigations — including an Italian actress’ allegation of rape in 2013.
According to law enforcement sources, detectives believe that case is promising for prosecution because the woman told her story to three people, including a priest, relatively soon after the alleged attack. LAPD detectives also have evidence the woman was a guest at the Beverly Hills hotel where she claims Weinstein attacked her, the sources said. The case does have flaws, they added. Detectives found little physical evidence of an attack and have been unable to secure proof that Weinstein was at the hotel when the woman says the rape occurred.
(James Queally reported from New York. Richard Winton reported from Los Angeles.)
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