Harvey Weinstein moved to California to face another sexual assault trial

Altogether some 90 women have leveled accusations of sexual assault and harassment against the former Hollywood powerhouse, whose downfall was seen as a major victory for the #MeToo movement.

Harvey Weinstein, 69, is already serving a 23-year prison term on sexual assault charges.
AP

Harvey Weinstein, 69, is already serving a 23-year prison term on sexual assault charges.

The disgraced former Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein has been extradited from New York to California to face trial on additional rape and assault charges. 

Weinstein was convicted in New York in February 2020 for sexual assault and rape and was sentenced to 23 years in prison.

In Los Angeles, he is wanted for trial on charges of attacking five women from 2004 to 2013.

The charges include rape, forcible oral copulation, sexual battery by restraint and sexual penetration by use of force.

The California charges were announced shortly before Weinstein's conviction in New York City on charges that he raped an aspiring actress in 2013 in a Manhattan hotel room and forcibly performed oral sex on a TV and film production assistant in 2006 at his Manhattan apartment.

If convicted, Weinstein could spend the rest of his life in prison.

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Appeal against conviction

Weinstein, 69, is appealing his New York conviction and sentence, and has denied having nonconsensual sex with anyone.

He has been fighting extradition to California on medical grounds, citing diabetes and cardiac, back and eyesight problems.

READ MORE: Weinstein to be extradited to California

"We will be fighting so that Harvey can receive his needed medical care and of course, so that he can be treated fairly. Due process, presumption of innocence and a fair trial are all still his right," his spokesman Juda Engelmayer said in a statement on Tuesday.

A New York judge in June approved Weinstein's extradition to California, denying his lawyers' request to keep him at a state prison near Buffalo until the start of jury selection in the Los Angeles case. 

Weinstein was one of the most powerful movie and TV producers in Hollywood before allegations by more than 80 women of sexual misconduct in 2017 led to criminal charges and fueled the wider #MeToo movement.

He co-founded the Miramax film studio, whose hit movies included "Shakespeare in Love" and "Pulp Fiction." His own eponymous film studio filed for bankruptcy in March 2018. 

In total, nearly 90 women have accused Weinstein of sexual harassment or assault.

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