Disgraced former film producer Harvey Weinstein pleaded not guilty to a new sex crime in New York on Wednesday.
The 72-year-old - awaiting a retrial in his landmark #MeToo rape and sexual assault case - is accused of committing a criminal act, namely forcing oral sex on a woman at some point between April 29, 2006, and May 6 of that year.
No details about the accuser appear in an indictment against jailed ex-movie mogul Weinstein, who came to court in a wheelchair.
Manhattan District Attorney Alvin Bragg said in a statement: “Thanks to this survivor who bravely came forward, Harvey Weinstein now stands indicted for an additional alleged violent sexual assault.”
Prosecutors revealed last week that Weinstein had been indicted on additional charges that weren’t part of the case that led to his now-overturned 2020 conviction.
A grand jury heard evidence of up to three alleged assaults - two in hotels in the Tribeca area and one at a lower Manhattan residential building said to taken place from the mid-2000s to 2016, according to prosecutors.
Weinstein is currently in the prison ward at Bellevue Hospital while awaiting a new trial in Manhattan.
His conviction for rape was overturned earlier this year in a majority decision from the Court of Appeal in New York after the original judge unfairly allowed testimony against him based on allegations that were not part of the case.
The retrial has been tentatively scheduled to begin November 12, though it’s likely to be delayed.
“Obviously, Mr Weinstein wants to go to trial as soon as humanly possible,” defence lawyer Arthur Aidala said.
However, Weinstein is serving a prison sentence for rape and sexual misconduct related to an incident in 2013 where he appeared uninvited in a woman’s Los Angeles hotel room during a film festival.
He was sentenced to 16 years in prison in February last year.
Weinstein has had serious health problems and been admitted to hospital multiple times recently. Earlier this month, he underwent emergency heart surgery.
Prosecutors want to fold the new charges into the retrial, but Weinstein’s lawyers say it should be a separate case. Judge Curtis Farber said on Wednesday he’d rule early next month on that issue.
A judge agreed last week to let Weinstein remain indefinitely in hospital instead of being transferred back to the infirmary ward at New York’s Rikers Island jail complex.
Once one of the most powerful people in Hollywood, Weinstein co-founded the film and television production companies Miramax and The Weinstein Company and produced films such as Shakespeare in Love and The Crying Game.
