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Annabella Sciorra, the woman who worries Harvey Weinstein's jury

2020-02-21T00:41:45.195Z


Half of the evidence requested by jurors is related to the 59-year-old actress, who accuses the film producer of having raped her more than 25 years ago


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The jury that will decide the future of Harvey Weinstein has revealed a special interest during the three days of deliberations: Annabella Sciorra. The actress, famous for her roles in True Love and Los Soprano , testified in late January that the film producer raped her more than 25 years ago, a crime she has already prescribed. Although the accusation is not part of the process, it can be an aggravating factor in the charge of "predatory" sexual assault, a legal term used to explain frequent criminal conduct. Of the six "notes" (evidence or clarification) that jurors have requested from Judge James Burke, three of them are related to Sciorra. It is not known when the verdict will be announced, but what is evident is that the testimony of the 59-year-old actress is being key in the discussions behind closed doors in the New York State Criminal Court.

On the second day of the trial, Sciorra took the stand to report the alleged violation. The alleged victim did not remember if it was in the winter of 1993 or 1994, but she detailed how Weinstein broke into her Manhattan apartment and immobilized her in bed. "He put his penis in my vagina and raped me," Sciorra repeated to the jury twice at the request of Assistant Attorney Joan Illuzzi-Orbon. According to her testimony, after agreeing to a dinner in Manhattan, the man of a thousand and one Oscar awards offered to take her home by car, which she agreed to. When he was alone in his room, wearing pajamas, "someone knocked on the door." It was Weinstein. "He put me in the room and threw me to bed." Forcibly, Sciorra told between tears that he raped her and practiced oral sex.

In the first and only criminal proceeding of the Me Too movement, Weinstein is charged with five charges allegedly committed against two women: production assistant Mimi Haleyi, who accuses him of sexually abusing her in 2006 and actress Jessica Mann, of having her violated in 2013. In the event that the jury convicts the film producer of one or both charges of first degree sexual offense (criminal sexual act and / or rape), Sciorra's accusation would allow escalation of charges to a most serious crime: predatory sexual assault, the only one that risks life imprisonment. In addition to the testimony of the actress, three other women declared during the trial to have been abused to some extent by Weinstein. The New York Prosecutor's Office called a score of witnesses to support the testimonies.

This Tuesday, just the first day of the jury's deliberations began, one of the requests they made to Judge Burke was that they explain the combination of the charges (if the first-degree sexual offense is recognized, it is scaled to the sexual predator) and how is it that there are witnesses who are not directly part of the charges, such as Sciorra. In the afternoon, he was asked for a copy of all the emails that Weinstein sent to the Israeli spy agency Black Cube that contained listings of women highlighted in red. The producer hired the company's services to silence women who publicly accused him of sexual harassment. On the list of alleged victims he sent to do their job, Sciorra's name appeared in red.

On Wednesday afternoon, the five women and seven men who make up the jury asked the judge to read the testimony given by actress Rosie Pérez. The winner of three Emmy awards for her work as a choreographer in In Living Color corroborated Sciorra's story during the trial. Perez said he called his friend one day to go out for a drink and she answered with a "strange" voice. "I think something bad happened ... I think they raped me," the alleged victim told him. The jury also asked to review the statement of Paul Feldsher, a witness summoned by Weinstein's defense. The film producer testified: "I remember Annabella telling me that she had done this madness with Harvey." During the interrogation, the defense was not allowed to ask him if he thought the comment was "of a sexual nature."

Almost to conclude the third day of deliberations this Thursday, the jury asked him to listen again to the interrogation made by Weinstein's defense of the actress of True Love "and all subsequent statements of Annabella Sciorra's testimony". The judge will read the full document this Friday morning in court, which will meet until 3 pm local time, two hours earlier than usual, which reduces the speculative chances that it will be the day the verdict is known.

Source: elparis

All life articles on 2020-02-21

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