Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 Rape Conviction OVERTURNED by New York’s Top Appeals Court
Harvey Weinstein’s 2020 rape conviction was overturned this week by New York’s highest appeals court, RadarOnline.com can report.
In a shocking development to come roughly four years after Weinstein, 72, was found guilty of felony sex crimes and sentenced to 23 years in state prison, an appeals court overturned the bombshell decision on Thursday.
According to the Associated Press, the judge who oversaw the disgraced movie producer’s infamous #MeToo trial in 2020 had prejudiced the trial with "improper rulings" – including one decision to allow women to testify about allegations that were not relevant to the case at hand.
“We conclude that the trial court erroneously admitted testimony of uncharged, alleged prior sexual acts against persons other than the complainants of the underlying crimes,” the court’s 4-3 decision said. “The remedy for these egregious errors is a new trial.”
“It is an abuse of judicial discretion to permit untested allegations of nothing more than bad behavior that destroys a defendant’s character but sheds no light on their credibility as related to the criminal charges lodged against them,” the court’s majority added.
While the New York appeals court ordered a new trial for Weinstein, it should be noted that the disgraced movie mogul will remain in prison due to a separate rape conviction in Los Angeles back in 2022.
Judge Madeline Singas penned a blistering dissent opinion in response to the appellate court's decision. Judge Singas argued that the appeal court's 4-3 majority was “whitewashing the facts to conform to a he-said/she-said narrative” and continuing a “disturbing trend of overturning juries’ guilty verdicts in cases involving sexual violence.”
“The majority’s determination perpetuates outdated notions of sexual violence and allows predators to escape accountability,” the dissenting judge wrote.
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As RadarOnline.com previously reported, Weinstein was found guilty of “forcibly performing oral sex” on an assistant in 2006 as well as rape in the third degree for an attack on an actress in 2013 during his 2020 New York trial.
Several women came forward beginning in 2017 with damning allegations against Weinstein.
- Shattered Harvey Weinstein Indicted on Shocking Fresh Sexual Assault Criminal Charges — Before Disgraced Hollywood Mogul Faces Rape Retrial
- Harvey Weinstein Dodges Indecent Assault Charges in UK as Prosecutors Drop Investigation Into Disgraced Hollywood Producer
- Even More Women Coming Out to Accuse Disgraced Hollywood Titan Harvey Weinstein of Assault
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Ashley Judd, the first actress to come forward with allegations against the movie mogul roughly seven years ago, slammed the New York appellate court’s decision to overturn Weinstein’s 2020 conviction.
“That’s really hard for the survivors,” Judd said in a statement to the New York Times. “We still live in our truth. And we know what happened.”
Meanwhile, Weinstein's lawyer celebrated the court's decision to overturn the embattled movie producer's 2020 conviction.
“We all worked very hard and this is a tremendous victory for every criminal defendant in the state of New York," Arthur Aidala said shortly after the bombshell ruling was announced on Thursday morning in New York.