After Harvey Weinstein’s rape conviction in New York was overturned this week, a woman who accused him of sexual assault said Friday she was unsure she could testify again if he was re-tried.
Mimi Haley claimed she felt “sick to my stomach” when she learned a court had overturned the former Hollywood power player’s sentence.
“People really don’t know what I and the other women had to go through,” Haley told reporters about Weinstein’s 2020 trial.
“It’s exhausting, difficult… You’ve been living in fear for years. And then you are hounded.
“There’s so much stuff that people don’t see that I had to live with.”
In 2017, bombshell claims surfaced against the Oscar-winning producer, kicking off the #MeToo movement, which empowered women to fight back against workplace sexual harassment.
Weinstein, 72, was convicted in 2020 of raping and sexually assaulting ex-actress Jessica Mann in 2013 and forcibly performing oral sex on former production assistant Haley in 2006. He was sentenced to 23 years in prison.
Read News
Several people are feared dead after a tanker explosion on an east-west road in Rivers
On Thursday, New York’s highest court found that the trial judge erred in accepting testimony from women who were allegedly harmed by Weinstein but were not identified in the allegations against him.According to sources, the Manhattan District Attorney’s office has signaled that it would seek a retrial, which will almost definitely need Haley to testify again.
If Weinstein is retried, Haley believes he should be convicted despite the lack of evidence from so many other women.
“The truth doesn’t change,” she replied.
“The evidence is still there, so I don’t see why it would be another result.”
Haley stated that she was still absorbing the situation but would consider mounting the witness stand again.
“I definitely don’t want to actually go through that again, but for the sake of keeping going and doing the right thing — because it is what happened — I would consider it,” she went on to say.
The ruling on Thursday had no bearing on Weinstein’s separate 16-year rape sentence imposed in California, and he remains in prison.
IGP insists Nigeria is not’mature’ for state police