At 9:11 am, Monday January 6, Harvey Weinstein entered the courtroom with his walker on the fifteenth floor of the Manhattan Court. Dark suit, gloomy, frightfully aged. The 67-year-old former film producer, accused of rape, was flanked by his four lawyers, including Chicago bar star Donna Rotunno, male defense lawyer, fuchsia shirt and stilettos.
At 9:25 a.m., judge James Burke appeared in this small, packed room with 120 seats and began to organize the proceedings. And it doesn't start very well for the Weinstein camp. His lawyers want the twelve jurors, who will be chosen over the next two weeks from 500 New Yorkers, to be confined, so as not to hear anything from the media about the case. Application rejected.
They wish to call New York police detective Nicholas DiGaudio, discharged from the investigation as a witness, for failing to bring to the prosecution the testimony weakening the file of a complainant and for having suggested to a victim to redact his telephone elements concerning his private life. Rejected too.
Four women to be heard
Prosecutor Joan Illuzzi-Orbon asked that Weinstein’s lawyers no longer be allowed to give press interviews, accusing them of having disparaged and humiliated the victims. Donna Rotunno is then called by the judge: " What have you done ? "I didn’t do anything inappropriate", answers the lawyer, who denies having attacked the victims. Judge Burke does not give satisfaction to the prosecution but lectures the lawyer: "Leave the witnesses alone, understand?" Do not talk about them under any circumstances ", orders the judge.
The victims – one, anonymous, accuses Mr. Weinstein of rape and the second, Mimi Haleyi, of having forced her cunnilingus – and not of having obtained a blowjob as we wrote yesterday by mistake – n 'were not present, but their lawyers were, notably Douglas Wigdor, former defender of Nafissatou Diallo, the chambermaid of the Sofitel, accuser of Dominique Strauss-Kahn. "I had the honor of defending Nafissatou Diallo against DSK in 2011, but I am hopeful that we will get there, because the company has advanced", said Mr. Wigdor to Paris Match.
As in the trial of Bill Cosby, a TV star sentenced to 2018 prison in Pennsylvania, the prosecution will hear additional women – four so far – whose testimony has not led to the indictment of Mr. Weinstein. They must support the accusation of serial assault. Harvey Weinstein pleaded not guilty and assured that all relationships were consensual.
