#SHOWBIZ: Harvey Weinstein found guilty of sexual assault
NEW YORK: Disgraced Hollywood titan Harvey Weinstein was found guilty of one sexual assault Wednesday and not guilty of another, with jurors still considering a rape charge at his retrial at which three women recounted in graphic detail how he victimised them.
Weinstein was retried for offenses against two women, Jessica Mann whom he is alleged to have raped, and Miriam Haley whom he was found to have sexually assaulted, alongside new charges of assaulting ex-model Kaja Sokola.
He was found not guilty of those new charges at the tense proceeding in a Manhattan court on Wednesday.
Delivering the verdict of the seven women and five men of the jury on the Haley count, the foreman said: "Guilty."
He shook his head when he was asked for a verdict on the rape of Mann, and said "not guilty" on the Sokola count.
Weinstein looked on impassively close by, seated in a wheelchair and wearing a dark suit as he has done throughout the six weeks of hearings.
But later the 73-year-old appeared to mutter "Not true" as he was wheeled out of court.
The judge ordered the legal teams for both sides not to speak to the media as the jury continued to deliberate on the outstanding charge.
The Oscar-winner's conviction is a vindication for Haley, whose complaint in part led to the initial guilty verdict in 2020, and helped fire the "MeToo" movement that saw an outpouring of allegations from prominent women who were abused by men.
Weinstein underwent a spectacular fall from his position astride the world of Hollywood and show business in 2017 when the first allegations against him exploded into public view.
The movement upended the film industry, exposing the systemic exploitation of young women seeking to work in entertainment, and provoking a reckoning on how to end the toxic culture.
More than 80 women accused Weinstein of sexual misconduct in the wake of the global backlash against men abusing positions of power.
Weinstein's original 2020 conviction, and the resulting 23-year prison term, was thrown out last year after an appeals court found irregularities in the way witnesses were presented. - AFP
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