Buffalo Bills punter Matt Araiza walks on the sideline during the first half of a preseason NFL football game against the Indianapolis Colts in Orchard Park, N.Y., on Aug. 13, 2022. The Buffalo Bills cut Araiza from the team on Saturday, Aug. 27, two days after a lawsuit was filed alleging the player and two college teammates gang-raped a teenager last fall. (AP Photo/Adrian Kraus, File)
US court decision offers the disgraced former Hollywood mogul a slim chance of being granted a new trial.
Weinstein is jailed in California, where he was extradited last year and awaits trial on 11 charges of misconduct toward five women between 2004 and 2013.
(Mark Lennihan / AP)
New York state's highest court has agreed to allow Harvey Weinstein to appeal his rape and sexual assault conviction, offering the disgraced former movie executive a chance of being granted a new trial.
Chief Judge Janet DiFiore "granted leave to appeal" on August 19, the court wrote in a letter dated on Monday that was sent to Weinstein's lawyers and reviewed by the Reuters news agency on Wednesday.
The letter did not detail what grounds may have led to the decision and it has no bearing on further rape charges against him in California.
Upon weighing arguments from Weinstein's lawyers and prosecutors, the court can uphold the conviction or order a new trial. Last June, a lower appeals court upheld the conviction, rejecting arguments that the Manhattan trial judge made several errors that tainted the trial.
The bar for ordering a new trial is high, but Weinstein was "relieved at this decision," said one of his lawyers, Arthur Aidala, after speaking with his client in prison.
"He's hopeful that the court is going to find that he did not receive a fair trial and reverse his conviction. And, as he has consistently, he maintained his innocence," Aidala said.
READ MORE:Harvey Weinstein to be extradited to California to face rape charges
Weinstein, 70, a Hollywood power broker who produced "Pulp Fiction," "Shakespeare in Love" and "Gangs of New York," became one of the most prominent targets of the #MeToo and #TimesUp movements that alleged sexual abuse at the highest levels of corporate America, entertainment and the media.
In February 2020, a Manhattan jury found Weinstein guilty of raping a former aspiring actress and sexually assaulting a production assistant. A judge sentenced him to 23 years in prison.
Weinstein is jailed in California, where he was extradited last year and awaits trial on 11 charges of misconduct toward five women between 2004 and 2013.
Weinstein has pleaded not guilty to rape and sexual assault charges in Los Angeles.
Source: Reuters
Thousands of armed residents raid illegal mines and target workers, known as "zama zamas", in Kagiso township, as outrage widens over mass rape of eight women last week west of Johannesburg city.
Authorities say the situation has stabilised and 29 undocumented people had been arrested on charges of illegal immigration.
(AFP)
Thousands of angry South African protesters have hunted down miners without permits, sealing makeshift shafts and burning houses, after the mass rape of eight women last week west of Johannesburg city.
Armed with machetes, golf clubs and hammers, mobs of residents on Thursday moved from one area to another on the fringes of the town's Kagiso township, trying to smoke out miners operating illegally in informal shafts.
The AFP news agency reporters at the scene saw residents torching a house thought to belong to a gangmaster.
Local television footage showed protesters using boulders to close makeshift mine shafts in a Kagiso district known as Soul City.
Police kept a distance and fired stun grenades from a helicopter to disperse the crowds.
Later in the evening, authorities said the situation had stabilised and 29 undocumented people had been arrested on charges of illegal immigration.
Police said a murder and public violence investigation was opened after the body of a man was found near the area in the morning.
It was not immediately clear if the death was linked to the protests.
Police Minister Bheki Cele has said informal miners commonly known as "zama zamas" –– believed to largely be undocumented foreigners –– were likely behind the attack on July 28 in the town of Krugersdorp.
'Zama zamas must go'
In an incident that has shocked the nation, which is usually numb to violent crime, a gang of gunmen forced their way into a music video shoot near a mine dump in Krugersdorp.
They robbed the crew and raped eight young models who were part of the cast.
Authorities have arrested more than 100 people since the assault –– most of them migrants for being in the country illegally, according to an AFP tally.
"The zama zamas must go, they are attacking our sisters," 39-year-old protester Daniel Nzuma told AFP.
Residents in the town around 30 kilometres west of Johannesburg blamed poor policing for the deepening illegal mining crisis.
Kagiso police "have failed", said Nzuma.
"The army must come and assist the police in this area to protect the community."
South Africa's commercial hub of around six million is built around mountainous dumps of soil and cavernous pits left behind by generations of mining companies that extracted gold during the 1880s gold rush.
Armed gangs of informal miners run rampages and battle for control of the abandoned shafts to exploit any remaining gold.
