Harvey Weinstein found not guilty as Judge approves hospital transfer amid health issues
A judge has found Harvey Weinstein not guilty despite his frequent hospital stays during his jail term.
On April 17, a New York judge decided that the 73-year-old disgraced Hollywood mogul may be sent from Rikers Island to the Manhattan prison wing of Bellevue Hospital while his criminal court retrial proceeded. Imran H. Ansari, Weinstein’s attorney, responded to the news in a statement to USA TODAY on Friday.
To get the medical care he needs as he starts his trial, Harvey Weinstein is happy with the court’s order requiring the city to move him from Rikers Island to Bellevue Hospital. Without a doubt, Rikers Island is the best illustration of a dangerous and inadequate prison,” Ansari stated in the statement.
His attorneys continued, “Mr. Weinstein has suffered tremendously within its walls, and no human in his medical condition, regardless of what they are accused of, should be treated so inhumanely and without any regard to the protections of our Constitution.”
Recently, the originator of Miramax has had several health problems. One of Weinstein’s attorneys mentioned in a November filing that the medical conditions included chronic myeloid leukemia (bone marrow cancer), diabetes, coronary artery disease, obstructive sleep apnea, thyroid difficulties, obesity, high blood pressure, and chronic back pain. Imran H. Ansari, the attorney, charged that Rikers Island Correctional Facility “failed to render proper medical treatment.”
Weinstein tested positive for COVID-19 in July after being admitted to Bellevue Hospital for “myriad” medical issues. In addition, he had double pneumonia while in the hospital. In September, he underwent emergency heart surgery.
Since being found guilty of rape in February 2020 and given a 23-year jail sentence, Weinstein has been taken to Bellevue Hospital in New York City multiple times. Last year, the judges of the New York Court of Appeals overturned the conviction after concluding that the trial’s presiding judge had permitted “irrelevant” testimony from women whose accusations were not at issue.
Jury selection for Weinstein’s retrial has begun. He has entered a not guilty plea to all three allegations, which include third-degree rape and first-degree criminal sex act.
Three women are at the focus of the retrial; two of them claim Weinstein forced them to have oral sex in 2006, and the third says he sexually assaulted her in 2013.
Since sexual assault accusations against the “Shakespeare in Love” producer sparked the #MeToo movement in 2017, Weinstein has consistently refuted any allegations that he had nonconsensual sex.
New York Gov. Kathy Hochul decided Weinstein could stay in New York until the conclusion of his case, after which he would be sent back to California to serve a 16-year prison sentence resulting from his 2022 conviction in Los Angeles, Queens District Attorney Melinda Katz announced in August 2024.
