Harvey Weinstein and Disney Hit With New Rape Lawsuits by Four Women

A new lawsuit has been filed against disgraced movie producer Harvey Weinstein, who was recently hit with a 23-year prison sentence for sexual assault.

Harvey Weinstein
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Harvey Weinstein

A new lawsuit has been filed against disgraced movie producer Harvey Weinstein, who was recently hit with a 23-year prison sentence. As The Hollywood Reporter noted, the new lawsuit was filed against Weinstein on Thursday. In the court documents filed in New York, it is alleged that Weinstein raped four women, including one who was just 17 at the time he allegedly sexually assaulted her.

Content warning: This story includes descriptions of sexual assault and rape.

The assaults in question took place between 1984 and 2013, with a 43-year-old woman alledging that the former Weinstein Company head raped her in 1994 when she was 17. In the filing, the anonymous woman claims that she met with one of Weinstein's associates "under the guise of doing business." The meeting, as with similar allegations leveled against Weinstein, happened in his hotel room. She claims that he demanded she "sexually gratify him" in order for him to give her a job. She rejected his advances, and he allegedly "forced her to remove her clothes" and raped her. Additionally, she said that he took her driver's license and threatened to blacklist her from the film industry if she told anyone. He said that he would "have his associates track her down and physically harm her and her family."

Another woman, who is currently 70, has alleged that Weinstein raped her in 1984 when she was 34. She claims he assaulted her during the Cannes Film Festival, and that he took her to one of his hotel suites and "pinned her against the suite's front door" before raping her. Once again, he allegedly threatened to have her "blackballed from the industry" if she ever told anyone what happened.

The third woman says she was raped by Weinstein in 2008 when she was 26. She said that she was "scouted" by Weinstein, promising to "take her career to the next level." When she showed up to a meeting at his apartment in Soho, she said that she was told she couldn't leave the apartment until she "did what he wanted." He also allegedly threatened to ruin her career.

The fourth woman in the new lawsuit, said that Weinstein raped her in 2013 when she 28. Shortly after meeting him at the Venice Film Festival, he invited her to his office for an "audition." While the audition never happened, when she and her friend met Weinstein for dinner a few months later, she was asked to come back to his hotel room at midnight. She went along with her friend due to the time of night the alleged meeting was to take place, but he convinced the friend to leave in order to have a "one-on-one" talk. He allegedly proceeded to expose himself to her, and then forced her to perform oral sex on him. 

Alongside Harvey Weinstein, his brother Bob, Miramax, and Disney are also named in the lawsuit. It is alleged that the other parties in the suit "knew or reasonably should have known that Harvey Weinstien had propensity to engage in sexual misconduct and would use his position and power to lure Plaintiffs and other similarly situated aspiring female actresses to his apartments, hotel rooms, offices, etc. under the guise of discussing business opportunities to sexually harass, batter, assault, falsely imprison, and rape them." 

The lawsuit alleges that Bob Weinstien knew of Harvey's history, but chose to ignore it. So far, the former movie producer has been accused of rape and assault by over 100 women. He is currently being held in isolation at Wende Correctional Facility in New York after he tested positive for coronavirus. In April, Weinstien was hit with an additional sexual assault charge in Los Angeles.

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