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Harvey Weinstein’s rape charge ended in a mistrial today, after the jury foreperson said he felt threatened by other jurors. Yesterday, Weinstein’s 12-person jury found the disgraced mogul guilty of one criminal sexual act against former Project Runway assistant Miriam Haley, and not guilty of another against former model Kaja Sokola. He jury was not able to reach a verdict on a third rape charge, related to actor Jessica Mann, after days of tense deliberation.
After four days of discussions, jurors were sent home Wednesday afternoon after reports of fighting in the jury room, per The Hollywood Reporter. That day, the jury foreperson reportedly sent a note asking to speak to Judge Curtis Farber, after which he told Farber and attorneys, “I feel afraid inside there. I can’t be inside there.” He went on to explain that he felt other jurors were pressuring him to change his decision, and said, “Oh we will see you outside,” when he refused. When asked whether he would return to the jury room on Thursday, he said he would not.
When Farber spoke to other jurors on Thursday, they said they “don’t understand why the foreperson bowed out.” Tension was apparently so high on Wednesday, however, that Weinstein himself addressed the court to ask for a mistrial. “This is not right for me, the person who is on trial here… This is my life that’s on the line, and you know what? It’s not fair. It’s simple. It’s just not fair,” he said.
Earlier this week, the foreperson had asked to speak to the judge, claiming that other jurors were considering elements from Weinstein’s past that weren’t submitted as evidence in this particular trial. Previously, a different juror had asked to be excused from the trial, proclaiming he had heard jurors talking about other jurors in the elevators and the process wasn’t “fair.”
“If you’re a deliberating juror you have to be punched in the face in order for it to rise to the level of a real threat,” Weinstein’s attorney, Arthur Aidala, said Thursday. “It’s insane in the membrane, insane on the brain.”
This retrial is happening in the first place for a similar reason. Weinstein’s 2020 rape conviction was overturned in 2024, after a New York court determined that the original trial had been prejudiced due to the decision to let women testify about allegations that weren’t officially part of the case.
Weinstein’s rape conviction, which stems from an alleged incident with Mann in 2013, will now be retried on July 2. Mann is “ready and willing and wants to retry this count,” prosecutors said.
