Harvey Weinstein, the disgraced movie mogul whose alleged sexual assaults sparked the international #MeToo movement, may be sentenced to a lifetime of shame and ridicule. Legal experts, however, now indicate he may never see the inside of a jail, let alone go to trial to face his accusers.
The case against Weinstein is "unraveling," high profile defense attorney and CNN legal analyst Mark Geragos says, citing the infighting between the Manhattan District Attorney's Office and the New York Police Department as one of the main reasons he believes the Weinstein case won't go to trial.
"If you're on the defense here, you just sit back and watch them cannibalize themselves," said Geragos, who has represented high-profile clients, such as Michael Jackson and Colin Kaepernick.
In October 2017,
The New Yorker released an audio recording of Weinstein speaking with model Ambra Battilana Gutierrez as part of a 2015 sting operation. Without consulting the DA's office,
the NYPD set up the sting after Gutierrez told authorities that Weinstein groped her a day earlier.
In the recording, Weinstein makes potentially incriminating comments to Gutierrez, apologizing for touching her breast. Weinstein was not arrested or charged with a crime at the time.
"While the recording is horrifying to listen to, what emerged from the audio was insufficient to prove a crime under New York law," Chief Assistant District Attorney Karen Friedman-Agnifilo said, defending the DA's decision not to prosecute Weinstein.
After the tape's release, the New York Police Department and the Manhattan DA's office
traded public finger-pointing.
The infighting, Geragos says, is symbolic of this "political hot potato" case, where the lines of public opinion and in-court litigation are getting blurred.
"A criminal courtroom is not a pretty place," he said, "certainly not a place to litigate social justice change."
Ever since
The New Yorker's bombshell reportdetailed allegations against Weinstein ranging from aggressive overtures to rape, his accusers and their supporters have called for justice.
The NYPD encouraged the public to call in tips related to Weinstein to the Crime Stoppers hotline, and investigators cast their nets wide with police investigating sexual assault accusations in New York, Los Angeles and London.
Last week, Detective Nicholas DiGaudio was accused of
coaching a witness, causing one of the six felony charges against Weinstein to be thrown out.