The jury members who decided that the fate of Harvey Weinstein in his new new newest continues to take a break and “cool down” earlier on Wednesday, because their discussions were apparently broken in the midst of screaming and threats.
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After a private meeting, the unusual admonition came between a jury member and the judge who supervised the trial – the third such conversation in a trial characterized by jury problems – and led Mr Weinstein to appeal directly to the judge in a failed bid for a mistrial.
The dramatic development only came a few hours before the judgment on Wednesday, when the jury’s foreman asked to talk to the judge, Justice Curtis Farber, and was taken to a back room where he told the judge and the lawyers.
The foreman, who came to the United States from the Dominican Republic in 1996, said that he had made a decision about one of the charges against Mr Weinstein and his position would not change, causing other jury members to shout at him, according to a transcript of their conversation.
The deliberations had been heated so that a jury member told him: “Oh, we will see you outside,” the foreman told Judge Farber. “They keep attacking me.”
“They try to change thoughts?” Judge Farber asked him.
“Trying to change thoughts” and speak to him in a “bad way,” said the foreman. “You talk to me loudly, I have to defend myself.”
Mr Weinstein was in court during the extraordinary exchange.
But after Judge Farber came out and spent the conversation in Open Court, Mr Weinstein asked if he could address the court directly. The battle under the jury of seven women and five men resulted in an unfair process, Mr Weinstein said.
“This is not good for me, for me the person who is tried here,” he said. “This is my life at stake and you know what, it’s not fair. It’s simple. It is not fair.”
He asked the judge to explain a mistrial and “find another jury that is not fighting.”
Justice Farber thanked Mr Weinstein and tried to reassure him. “I’m not going to allow some unjust to happen to you,” he said. The judge said Mr Weinstein that it was not the first time that similar problems had developed among jury members.
“Jury members fight,” said Judge Farber. “They sometimes act childishly. They are heated.”
During the closed-door conversation, the foreman Judge Farber said that he felt ‘scared within it’.
“I can’t get in there,” said the foreman according to the transcript.
“Are you worried about your safety?” Judge Farber asked.
The foreman said yes and described how a jury member returned from the bathroom and looked at him. Two other jury members could support his claims, the foreman said.
“People keep attacking other people,” said the foreman.
The episode caused another glimpse into friction that can often develop among jury members in tests with high deployment, disagreements that generally remain behind closed doors.
It was not the first time that conflicts between the jury members who heard the Weinstein introduction in the sight of the court in the four days had been in sight since they started their discussions. The jury member was the third to speak with Judge Farber since Friday.
On Friday, a jury member said he had heard others in the jury – talking about another member of the group in a lift and outside the courthouse on Thursday. What he had heard, he believed, came down to misconduct. Judge Farber thanked the man and the jury returned to their deliberations.
On Monday, the foreman first emerged to say that he was worried about the arguments in the jury room. The other jury members, he told the judge and the lawyers outside the courtroom, also talked about the past of Mr Weinstein.
“I don’t hear about his past,” said the jury member and added: “I am here to make the decision itself for what has happened at the moment.”
Judge Farber asked him to return to the deliberations and gave the full panel of jury members instructions on civil deliberations.
A third jury member, a woman, asked to talk to the judge later that day to let him know that the deliberations had gone well.
The friction led to Mr Weinstein’s lawyer, Arthur L. Aidala, repeatedly and in vain for a mistrial early. On Wednesday, after the foreman complained again, Mr. Aidala asked for a new mistrial and the judge accused the jury members.
“He is clearly intimidated,” Mr Aidala said about the foreman. Judge Farber denied his request for a mistrial and said that jury members always fight.
“He is a big guy,” said Judge Farber about the foreman. “He’s not very scared. He actually says: ‘I am not changing thoughts. “He is not intimidated to change your mind. ‘
Moments later the jury returned and gave his partial judgment: guilty of committing a criminal sexual act in the first degree for one prosecutor, Miriam Haley, and not guilty of the same count for a second, Kaja Sokola, a model. The jury will be called back on Thursday to continue the deliberations on the third count of the process, of third -degree rape, connected to accusations that Mr Weinstein attacked Jessica Mann.
Mr Weinstein was convicted of rape and a criminal sexual act during the Manhattan trial in 2020. The verdict, which resulted in a 23-year prison sentence, was seen as a turning point for the #Metoo movement. He was then convicted of sexual violence in a separate case in Los Angeles and sentenced to 16 years in prison there. He appeals to that judgment.
Last year the highest court in New York destroyed the conviction of Manhattan, and the public prosecutor in Manhattan, Alvin L. Bragg, said his office would move to try Mr Weinstein again.
In April, after a new criminal sexual act was added to the case, Jury selection before recording began.
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