Model says she ‘wanted to die’ during Harvey Weinstein’s alleged assault

A model-turned-actress testified Tuesday that she “wanted to die” during an alleged sexual assault by a former film producer Harvey Weinstein in his Los Angeles hotel room nearly a decade ago.

The woman, identified in court only as “Jane Doe #1,” told a downtown Los Angeles jury hearing Weinstein’s criminal case that he outweighed her by “probably 100 to 150 pounds,” began ordering her around and abused her to her, as with her. was “a box-like object that looked like nothing.”

“I was kind of hysterical through the tears,” she said. “I say stop, I say no.”

When questioned by Deputy District Attorney Paul Thompson about the alleged rape in the bathroom of her hotel room, she said: “I wanted to die. It was disgusting. It was offensive, miserable. I didn’t fight. I remember him looking in the mirror and… I wish it had never happened.”

The woman testified that she left and that Weinstein told her, “Come on, you’re not a little girl. You like it, tell me you like it,” and that he then asked her to look in the mirror while he masturbated.

She said that afterwards Weinstein acted as if “nothing had happened” and “paid her compliments”, although she said she felt “humiliated” by what happened.

Weinstein is charged with three counts of aggravated rape, forcible oral intercourse and sexual penetration with a foreign object in connection with the alleged assault of a woman in February 2013, who told jurors that Weinstein visited her at will to talk to her in her hotel room and that she didn’t know how he knew where she was staying.

In his opening statement Monday, the prosecutor told jurors they will also hear from three other alleged victims, named in the indictment only as “Jane Doe #2,” “Jane Doe #3” and “Jane Doe #4,” along with four others . women to testify about Weinstein’s alleged sexual abuse.

Weinstein’s lawyer, Mark Werksman, countered that the two victims named in the indictment were “just made up” and that it was “transactive sex” for the other two women.

“You’ll find that it was all consensual sex, and in some cases it wasn’t at all,” Werksman said. “Mr. Weinstein is an innocent man who is not guilty of the charges in this indictment.”

Weinstein, now 70, has been indicted on 11 counts — including forcible rape, forcible oral sex, sexual penetration with a foreign object and sexual restraint — involving five women. But the prosecutor did not mention Jane Doe No. 5, who appears in four counts of the grand jury indictment, and the status of those charges was not immediately available.

In a statement released Monday, the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s Office said it has “no comment at this time” on charges related to “Jane Doe #5,” adding only that prosecutors are “working tirelessly to ensure that all victims in this case will get justice.”

During a non-jury hearing Tuesday, Werksman noted that the defense “does not expect” jurors to hear from all five alleged victims named in the indictment, but only the four mentioned by prosecutors in their opening statements.

The lawyer unsuccessfully opposed allowing the panel to hear testimony from a woman who claims there was an incident with Weinstein in which the defense attorney said there was no sexual contact.

At the start of her second day on the stand, Jane Doe #1 said she was not feeling well and wanted to “apologize” for her “outburst” on the stand Monday, which ended her testimony for the day.

She told jurors she felt guilty for doing or saying things that might have given him the wrong impression when he started talking to her about massages.

“His face changed, his eyes changed, his demeanor changed,” she said.

The woman testified that she told her babysitter that “something really bad happened to me,” but did not specify what happened. She said she decided to report what happened to Weinstein to police in 2017 after her teenage daughter told her she had been “terrorized” by the boy and urged her daughter to report the situation to police.

In his opening statement, the prosecutor said the alleged victims feared Weinstein, who he described as the most powerful person in the entertainment industry at the time, could destroy their careers if they came forward with the allegations, but one model came forward soon after. to report an alleged assault on her in a New York hotel room in 2015.

The prosecutor said one of the alleged victims, Jane Doe #4, is now married to the governor of California, and showed a photo of Gov. Gavin Newsom and his wife, but said she was a “powerless actress trying to make it in Hollywood.” she met Weinstein 17 years ago.

Jennifer Siebel Newsom, whose name was not released during the trial, is expected to testify about the alleged assault in a room at The Peninsula Hotel in Beverly Hills after first meeting him at the 2005 Toronto Film Festival.

“Jane Doe #4” said she was “crying and shaking” after Weinstein allegedly grabbed her hand in a hotel room bathroom, pulled her onto the bed and told her, “Relax, it’ll make you feel better,” the prosecutor believes.

Weinstein began his entertainment career as a concert promoter, then co-founded Miramax Films with his brother Bob, which has produced a string of “iconic and award-winning films,” including “Crime,” “The English Patient,” “Good Will Hunting “. ” and “Shakespeare in Love” and others, noted the prosecutor.

The films launched the careers of Matt Damon, Ben Affleck, Quentin Tarantino and Gwyneth Paltrow, Thompson said.

Weinstein’s lawyer agreed that his client was a “big player in Hollywood” but called him a “man of humble origins” who “wasn’t born with a silver spoon in his mouth.”

He told jurors the allegations “can be traced directly to the #MeToo movement” and said his client “has become the epicenter of the #MeToo movement.”

Werksman told the panel that Weinstein’s accusers were “women who willingly played the game by the rules that were in place at the time” and are now “claiming to have been raped and sexually assaulted.”

“He’s not Brad Pitt or George Clooney. He’s not hot,” Weinstein’s lawyer told jurors. “They had sex with him because he was strong…”

Weinstein, he said, “was once a very successful film producer” whose “name was synonymous with Oscars and blockbusters” but is now being described as a “vile monster”.

Weinstein was extradited from New York, where he was found guilty of raping an aspiring actress and committing a criminal sexual act against a former production assistant. The state’s highest court has since agreed to hear his appeal in the case.

Superior Court Judge Lisa Lench, who described the allegations as “essentially sexual assault or sexual assault,” told prospective jurors that the trial is expected to take about two months, including the jury selection process that began Oct. 10.

Weinstein, who was brought to court in a wheelchair without a jury, remains behind bars.

– City news service