Actress Tells Jury in Harvey Weinstein Rape Retrial About Hotel Room Assault, Needle in Waste Basket

The third and last alleged victim in the rape retrial of the disgraced film producer Harvey Weinstein testified in Manhattan criminal court on Monday. The onetime aspiring actress, Jessica Mann, cried during her testimony, as the defense geared up to cast doubt on her allegations, raising the thorny question of consent. “It’s really complicated,” Ms. Mann testified through tears, as she tried to explain why she maintained a relationship with Mr. Weinstein, whom she accuses of raping her at a hotel in Manhattan in 2013.Ms. Mann, 39, is the last of three alleged victims to testify in the retrial against the film producer. But unlike the other women, she was in a relationship with the defendant, which lasted for about five years. When an assistant district attorney, Nicole Blumberg, was questioning potential jurors in mid-April to see who would qualify to weigh the case, she asked if any of them did not believe that rape can be committed by a husband against his wife. Although none of the candidates disagreed, the issue is tricky and always a target for the defense team. Harvey Weinstein appears for his retrial at Manhattan criminal court on May 19, 2025. Stefan Jeremiah-Pool/Getty ImagesMs. Mann was never married to Mr. Weinstein, nor even a steady, long-term girlfriend (Mr. Weinstein was married to Georgina Chapman during the entire time he was involved with Ms. Mann). But like a wife, Ms. Mann had consensual sex with Mr. Weinstein — except for the time when, she claims, she said no. Born and raised on a dairy farm in Washington State, Ms. Mann, who now works as a hair stylist and cosmetologist, wanted to become an actress and moved to Los Angeles in her mid-20s. In the winter of 2012-13 she attended a party where she met Mr. Weinstein, the Oscar-winning movie producer who was behind iconic films like “Pulp Fiction” and “The English Patient.” According to her testimony, she accepted his offer to go to a bookstore on Sunset Strip in West Hollywood, where he bought her acting and film related reading materials. But he also asked her to give him a massage, which she did. Showing an interest in her acting aspirations, he invited her to industry parties, and one day lured her into a hotel room under the pretense of showing her a movie script. Once in the room, Mr. Weinstein performed oral sex on her. Ms. Mann, who was weeping throughout her entire testimony on Monday, said that she felt confused by the sexual advances but hoped that “if I was in a relationship, maybe it would feel different … I just thought that maybe it would take the pain away,” she said. Witness Ewa Sokola, sister of Harvey Weinstein accuser Kaja Sokola, arrives in state court in Manhattan on May 7, 2025. Spencer Platt/Getty imagesIn the afternoon, Assistant District Attorney Matthew Colangelo began to inquire about the rape allegation. Ms. Mann told the court that she had come to visit New York with her friends in March 2013, only a few months after she first met Mr. Weinstein in Los Angeles. It was her first time in the city, and she was staying at a hotel in Manhattan. She made plans with Mr. Weinstein, who had an apartment in New York, so he could have breakfast with her and meet her friends.But Mr. Weinstein arrived early. “I got a call from the front desk and there was someone there to see me and it was Harvey. … I wasn’t even dressed, I had to put some clothes on … and I got really nervous, like why is he so early?” Ms. Mann said. She went downstairs to the lobby, where she saw that Mr. Weinstein was at guest reception, booking a hotel room. Harvey Weinstein appears for his retrial at Manhattan criminal court on May 19, 2025. Steven Hirsch-Pool/Getty Images“Harvey was at the front desk and he was asking for a room … and I was really confused and I walked up to him and said, ‘What are you doing? We don’t need a room.’” She said that Mr. Weinstein pulled her aside and told her, “Don’t embarrass me in public.” “I had a lot of anxiety and I started pacing,” Ms. Mann went on, saying she tried to indicate to the receptionist by shaking her head not to give him a room. “I didn’t wanna go into the room. I was pleading for help.” Mr. Weinstein easily booked the room and Ms. Mann followed him upstairs. Once inside, she testified, she repeatedly said, “Please, I don’t wanna do this.” She attempted, she said, to open the door, but he “slammed” it shut. “And I open it again and he closes it again,” Ms. Mann said. Then he told her, “Undress now — undress now,” and grabbed her by her wrists. Actress Jessica Mann, left, arrives to testify in Harvey Weinstein’s rape and sexual assault trial, May. 19, 2025, in New York. AP/Stefan JeremiahWhen asked by Mr. Colangelo about his weight and size, Ms. Mann said, “He is really big. He is ox-like, very sturdy and very strong.” Ms. Mann appeared nervous as she relayed her allegations to the jury. She spoke rapidly, often through tears, breathing heavily.“And he waited until I was fully naked.” She went on. “This is about the moment I just gave up. … And he went into the bathroom. And I don’t know what he was doing in there. And then he proceeds to have sex with me.” She testified that it was “the first time” he actually penetrated her. Their previous encounters had not progressed beyond oral “play.” This time, “at some point he was done,” Ms. Mann went into the bathroom and, “I see something in the trash can. And it’s the first time I ever see anything like this. There is a needle in a trash can.” Harvey Weinstein appears for his retrial at Manhattan criminal court on May 19, 2025. Steven Hirsch-Pool/Getty ImagesMs. Mann learned that Mr. Weinstein was injecting himself with medicine to treat erectile dysfunction. She said the label said “necro-something,” which she later searched for on the internet. “I found on Google that it basically meant ‘dead penis,’ and you inject it and it can only be used a certain amount of times back-to-back over a certain time,” she testified. In his opening statement, defense attorney Arthur Aidala mentioned this alleged incident to the jury, and asked, rhetorically, why a woman, who does not want to have sex with a man, wouldn’t seize the opportunity to flee the room, if he is spending a lot of time in the bathroom. On Monday, the prosecution tried to refute his argument and asked the witness, “Did you think about leaving the hotel?” The prosecution’s key witness, Jessica Mann, center, arrives at Manhattan criminal court to testify at the sex assault trial of Harvey Weinstein on January 31, 2020. David Dee Delgado/Getty Images“I was naked,” Ms. Mann answered, adding, “You just give up.” When asked if she consented to the sexual intercourse, she said she did not and that up until that point, “We were just doing, like oral stuff.” She told the jury that seeing the needle in the trash “freaked” her out, especially because Mr. Weinstein had not used any protection and she worried she could have been “exposed to blood.” But she did not say anything. “I just got dressed and we went downstairs. … And we all had breakfast.” Ms. Mann explained that she did not mention anything to her friends, because she felt that “no one would believe” her. She said she was also scared of Mr. Weinstein due to his influence in the movie industry and in society in general. “I learned about his relationship with Bill Clinton,” she said, adding that she feared that if she said something, she’d “have the Secret Service right at my door.” She added, “I don’t know, I had all these ideas.”Attorneys Diana Fabi Samson and Arthur Aidala speak outside Harvey Weinstein’s retrial in Manhattan criminal court, April 24, 2025. AP/Julia Demaree NikhinsonThe prosecutor went on to ask about an audition for the lead role in the movie “Vampire Academy,” a part Mr. Weinstein had promised to help her get. The role was written, Ms. Mann testified, for a teenager, while she was 27 at the time, and she wondered if she even had a chance of getting the part. But Mr. Weinstein, she said, insisted it was a good role for her. After doing a reading for a casting website where auditions for the film were being held, and after certain roles had already been cast, she pressed Mr. Weinstein to fulfill his promise. But the audition she was told to go to was “the weirdest audition I’ve ever been to.” It was in a warehouse, she said. No professional lighting had been set up, and the person who introduced herself as the casting director forgot to record the scene, which Ms. Mann then had to repeat. She was never cast in the film. However, Ms. Mann continued to communicate with Mr. Weinstein and engaged in consensual sexual encounters for about five years. Her third-degree rape allegation is the lowest of the three charges Mr. Weinstein faces and carries a maximum of three years in prison, which the defendant has already served. An alleged victim of Harvey Weinstein, Kaja Sokola, center, arrives at Manhattan criminal court during Weinstein’s rape and sexual assault re-trial on May 8, 2025. Angela Weiss-Pool/Getty ImagesIn 2020, during his first trial, a jury convicted Mr. Weinstein of third-degree rape and of committing a criminal sexual act against a former producer, Miriam Haley, in 2006. The judge sentenced him to 23 years in prison. Last year New York’s highest court, the court of appeals, vacated the verdict and ordered a new trial. The court found that the trial judge had wrongly permitted damaging testimony from women whose allegations had not been part of the case. One of those women, the actress Annabella Sciorra, who had a memorable role in “The Sopranos,” gave devastating testimony that Mr. Weinstein barged into her apartment and raped her in 1993, and then ruined her career. Although these women are not permitted to testify in this trial, the presiding judge did allow the prosecution to question the three alleged victims who are part of the case about previous sexual encounters with Mr. Weinstein as evidence for consideration as background information. Witness Mimi Haley arrives to testify in the case against Harvey Weinstein as his retrial continues at Manhattan criminal court on April 30, 2025. Curtis Means-Pool/Getty ImagesA former Polish model, Kaja Sokola, who testified earlier in the trial, was permitted to describe an incident during which Mr. Weinstein allegedly forced his hands between her legs while he masturbated, when the model was only 16 years old. Ms. Sokola’s allegation was added onto the charges last year, while both Ms. Haley and Ms. Mann were already part of the previous trial. Mr. Weinstein has pleaded not guilty to all charges. Ms. Mann testified that the producer could not take no for an answer. “I wouldn’t want to do something and I felt like I was just being used for sex,” she said. “The word ‘no’ was a trigger for him. This other personality, I called it ‘the monster side,’ would come out.”Harvey Weinstein arrives at a Manhattan courthouse during his rape trial in 2020. AP/John MinchilloShe elaborated on this alleged monster personality, telling the jury that he would threaten to get waiters fired if they didn’t keep the restaurant open when he had arrived too late to order food.At the end of day, the prosecution pulled up an email from one of his managers offering to send a package to Ms. Mann’s home. She clarified that Mr. Weinstein had wanted to send her an envelope with cash, because he knew she was struggling and barely able to pay her rent. But she testified that she refused to accept the money.She said she felt like he was “trying to pay me like a dirty prostitute. I never took money from him. I never wanted his dirty money. I wasn’t for sale.” Mr. Weinstein, who is wheelchair-bound and has cancer among other ailments, sat at the defense table and shook his head during the entire testimony. Ms. Mann will return to court on Tuesday. The trial, which started with jury selection in mid-April, is expected to wrap up by the end of May.

Actress Tells Jury in Harvey Weinstein Rape Retrial About Hotel Room Assault, Needle in Waste Basket

Actress Tells Jury in Harvey Weinstein Rape Retrial About Hotel Room Assault, Needle in Waste Basket

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