Harvey Weinstein Fighting in Court to Get Old Personnel File That Will 'Exonerate' Him

Harvey Weinstein is the subject of currently four active criminal investigations in three different cities.

In March, months after disgraced Hollywood mogul Harvey Weinstein was accused by dozens of women of sexual assault and even rape, his production company, The Weinstein Company, filed for bankruptcy. Now, according to a new report in The Hollywood Reporter, Weinstein himself has gotten involved in the bankruptcy process by asking the court to force his former company to give him his old personnel file. He claims documents in there will “exonerate” him, and the fact that they have refused to give him the file is a violation of his due process rights.

This isn’t the first time Weinstein has attempted to get these documents. After he was fired from the company back in October, he tried to go to a Delaware court, but was unsuccessful. He is now in arbitration with his former company. 

The documents are important to Weinstein because, as stated in the motion, he is currently the subject of four active criminal investigations in New York, Los Angeles, and London. Law enforcement in each of those cases have requested to interview him and asked that he provide any “supporting documentation relating to their investigations.” Weinstein is looking in particular for some e-mails that he believes would be “exculpatory.” 

It’s not the first time Weinstein has pointed to e-mails to claim innocence. Earlier this year, Weinstein produced e-mails between him, Ben Affleck, and McGowan’s former agent Jill Messick that purportedly proved he did not rape Rose McGowan. Days later, Messick committed suicide

Weinstein filed court papers on Friday that argued "it is critical that Mr. Weinstein be granted access to e-mails relevant to the certain civil proceedings and criminal investigations and that are in the Debtors’ [The Weinstein Company] possession, as they were sent or received by his TWC e-mail accounts.”

In addition, Weinstein claims “the Debtors’ continued refusal to permit Mr. Weinstein to access these emails has significantly impinged his ability to effectively defend himself from these allegations and is a continuing deprivation of his due-process rights."

"TWC prefers that Mr. Weinstein be unable to defend himself," states Weinstein’s motion. "TWC’s withholding of exculpatory e-mails is a manifest injustice to an individual’s due process and should not be tolerated."

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