Harvey Weinstein Raped 17-Year-Old, New Lawsuit Alleges
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Harvey Weinstein, currently serving a 23 year prison term for rape, was hit with a new lawsuit Thursday that claims he raped an additional four women, one of whom was just 17 years old at the time.
The four Jane Does allege sexual assaults and rapes that occurred from 1984 to 2013, some after meetings with Weinstein at the Cannes and Venice Film Festivals.
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The anonymous accuser who was “approximately seventeen years old” in 1994 according to the lawsuit, alleges that Weinstein “falsely imprisoned, sexually assaulted, sexually battered and raped her.”
Known as Jane Doe II in the suit, the Tennessee woman stated that Weinstein asked her to his hotel room to discuss her prospective career in the industry, “made Plaintiff give him her driver’s license and told her that if she ever told anyone about what had just happened, he would not only make sure she never got to act in any films, but also have his associates track her down and physically harm her and her family.”
Weinstein’s brother Bob, Miramax and Disney are also named in the suit, which states that “Robert Weinstein, Disney, Miramax and Doe Corp. 1-10 knew or reasonably should have known that Harvey Weinstein had a 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 other plantiffs are a 70-year old woman from Ecuador who charged that when she was 34, Weinstein pinned her against the door and fondled her in his hotel room at the Majestic Hotel in Cannes in 1984, when she was looking to get her start in the film business as a documentarian.
A 38-year old woman said that Weinstein met her at Cipriani restaurant in Manhattan in 2008 and promised to “help take her career to the next level.” He allegedly raped her a few days later in his Soho apartment, threatening he would ruin her if she told anyone.
The most recent allegation was from a 2013 incident in which a 35-year-old Hungarian woman, who was 26 at the time, met Weinstein at the Venice Film Festival. He later forced her to perform oral sex on him when she visited his hotel room after an audition at his office.
Weinstein has been accused of rape and sexual assault by more than 100 women, including former model Kaja Sokola, who was 16 at the time she was assaulted by the disgraced mogul. He is expected to be extradited to Los Angeles later in 2020 to face another assault case.
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