Harvey Weinstein to be charged in UK over assault claims
By Associated Press
LONDON: British prosecutors mentioned Wednesday they’ve licensed police to cost former movie mogul Harvey Weinstein with two counts of indecent assault in opposition to a lady in London in 1996.
The Crown Prosecution Service mentioned in a press release that “charges have been authorized” in opposition to Weinstein, 70, following a overview of proof gathered by London’s Metropolitan Police.
Police mentioned the alleged offenses in opposition to the girl, now in her 50s, happened in throughout July and August 1996. After revelations about Weinstein emerged in 2017, British police mentioned they have been investigating a number of allegations of sexual assault that reportedly happened between the Eighties and 2015.
Unlike many different international locations, Britain doesn’t have a statute of limitations for rape or sexual assault.
Weinstein, the co-founder of the Miramax leisure firm and The Weinstein Company movie studio, was as soon as one of the highly effective individuals in Hollywood, having produced movies comparable to “Pulp Fiction” and “The Crying Game.”
He grew to become probably the most distinguished villain of the #MeToo motion after ladies started to go public in 2017 with accounts of his conduct.
Weinstein is serving a 23-year sentence after his 2020 conviction in New York for raping an aspiring actress in a New York City lodge room in 2013 and sexually assaulting manufacturing assistant Mimi Haleyi at his house in 2006.
He is jailed in California, the place he was extradited final yr, and is awaiting trial on expenses he assaulted 5 ladies in Los Angeles and Beverly Hills from 2004 to 2013. It’s not clear if the U.Okay. plans to hunt Weinstein’s extradition so he may stand trial in Britain.
The announcement in England on Wednesday got here two weeks after U.Okay. prosecutors licensed police to cost actor Kevin Spacey with 4 counts of sexual assault in opposition to three males. The alleged incidents happened in London between March 2005 and August 2008, and one in western England in April 2013.
