Harvey Weinstein, the once-powerful Hollywood producer behind Miramax and films like “Shakespeare in Love,” has been sentenced to 15 years in prison for sexually assaulting former assistant Miriam Haley. The sentence comes after a New York jury convicted him last year on a single count of committing a criminal sexual act against her.
Appearing in court in a wheelchair, the 74-year-old denied wrongdoing but apologized to “anyone I may have hurt.” Judge Curtis Farber was unsparing, telling Weinstein he had “taken what he wanted by force” and never accepted responsibility.
This marks the second time Weinstein has been sentenced in Haley’s case. He was first convicted in 2020, but New York’s highest court threw out that verdict in 2024, ruling the trial had been unfair, and ordered a retrial. Juries in the second trial could not agree on charges involving actress Jessica Mann and acquitted him in a case involving model Kaja Sokola.
Weinstein is currently held in a prison ward at Bellevue Hospital in New York due to ongoing health problems. He still faces re-sentencing in California, where he was convicted in 2022 of raping an actress in a hotel room in 2013.
The scandal surrounding Weinstein, which broke in 2017 through investigations by The New York Times and The New Yorker, exposed decades of alleged abuse and helped launch the global #MeToo movement against sexual misconduct.
Read the full BBC report for more details on the case and its long legal history.
Source: Harvey Weinstein sentenced to 15 years in prison for sexual assault (feeds.bbci.co.uk).
Image: ☺ Lee J Haywood, BY-SA 2.0 (via Openverse).