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Weinstein Pushes Again for Manhattan Case to Be Dismissed

NEW YORK — Four months ago, lawyers for Harvey Weinstein released dozens of emails shared between the Hollywood movie mogul and a woman who accused him of rape. The emails, they said, suggested the relationship was consensual and continued long after the alleged attack.

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Weinstein Pushes Again for Manhattan Case to Be Dismissed
By
Jan Ransom
, New York Times

NEW YORK — Four months ago, lawyers for Harvey Weinstein released dozens of emails shared between the Hollywood movie mogul and a woman who accused him of rape. The emails, they said, suggested the relationship was consensual and continued long after the alleged attack.

This week, the lawyers went further in their campaign to undermine the credibility of Weinstein’s remaining accusers when they filed another motion in state Supreme Court in Manhattan seeking to dismiss the indictment against him.

The new court papers accused the woman who has said she was raped by Weinstein of trying to get a female friend to back up her story. Instead, the papers said, the friend informed police that the woman “never ever told her that she was assaulted or raped by Mr. Weinstein.” The friend said she relayed this information to a detective who had traveled outside the city to interview her.

The friend’s account raised questions about the accuser and the Manhattan district attorney’s office. Weinstein’s lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, said prosecutors did not share “this highly exculpatory evidence” and again called for the charges against Weinstein to be dismissed.

“Simply put, because of the unprecedented and outrageous misconduct already documented in this case, this Court should properly give serious consideration to dismissal of this deeply flawed indictment,” Brafman wrote.

The district attorney’s office declined to comment. Justice James Burke is expected to make a decision on the motions Dec. 20.

The case against Weinstein has been unraveling in recent months.

Weinstein was initially indicted on charges that he raped the woman, who has not been identified, at a midtown Manhattan hotel in March 2013. He was also charged with physically forcing two other women to engage in oral sex with him: Lucia Evans, a marketing executive, in his Tribeca office in 2004 and Mimi Haleyi, a production assistant, at his apartment in 2006.

But in October, a judge dismissed the charge related to Evans after prosecutors acknowledged that the lead detective on the case had failed to tell them about a witness who had provided a conflicting account. The detective, Nicholas DiGaudio, has said that he did inform the lead prosecutor, Joan Illuzzi.

In the motion, Brafman called for an evidentiary hearing to investigate the extent of DiGaudio’s alleged misconduct. He said the court should hear testimony from DiGaudio; DiGaudio’s former supervisor, Sgt. Keri Thompson; and Illuzzi.

Brafman said Michael Osgood, the former chief of the Police Department’s special victims division, should also testify. Osgood led the effort to arrest Weinstein, and he worked with DiGaudio to interview potential witnesses in the investigation.

“The fact is, I’m stunned with how poorly the witnesses in this case have been vetted before they were allowed to serve as complainants in a criminal case that has the potential of a sentence of life imprisonment,” Brafman said during a phone interview.

Amid heightened scrutiny over the department’s handling of sex crimes, Osgood was ousted this month as commander of the unit and transferred to a new post, head of patrol operations in Staten Island. He later resigned.

The court filings in Weinstein’s case also included emails between Haleyi and the film producer, in which she responds in a friendly manner after the alleged attack, including one correspondence in which she wishes him, “Lots of love.”

In a motion the office filed last month, Kevin J. Wilson, an assistant district attorney, said, “Inspection will reveal that the evidence before the grand jury amply supported the offenses charged, that the grand jury was properly instructed on the law, and that the integrity of the proceedings was unimpaired.”

More than 80 women, including many actresses, have accused Weinstein of sexual harassment and sexual assault. The case started the global #MeToo movement.

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