In a news conference in Midtown Manhattan’s Palace Hotel, attorney Gloria Allred and Mimi Haleyi, the latest alleged victim of Harvey Weinstein, detailed a series of interactions with him in 2006 that culminated in an alleged sexual assault in his New York apartment.
The number of alleged victims of Weinstein now exceeds 50, dating back to the disgraced ex-mogul’s creation of Miramax in the 1980s.
Haleyi recalled meeting Weinstein in London for the 2006 premiere of The Aviator. She then connected with him in Cannes and New York, hoping to pursue a career in the entertainment business.
Like many of the accusers, she described a hotel meeting in Cannes that involved Weinstein asking for a massage. She declined. Later, after she had been a PA for a New York-based television show that Allred and Haleyi declined to name, she visited Weinstein’s apartment. There, she says he overpowered her in a dark bedroom and committed sexual assault.
Asked why she visited Weinstein after already experiencing unwanted contact, she said her reasons were professional. “I was hoping to keep a connection going,” she said. “But not romantic or sexual.”
Haleyi said she has since left the entertainment industry but declined to provide her current occupation.
Allred said she has not contacted police or made plans to file a civil lawsuit. She said she and Haleyi are discussing how to make her experience available to authorities in New York who are investigating Weinstein. Also, Allred used the packed news conference as a platform to invite Weinstein to engage in settlement talks.
“Vague apologies are not enough. It is time for him to take meaningful action,” said Allred, who on Friday in Los Angeles held a similar press conference with her ex-actress client Heather Kerr who also described being assaulted by Harvey Weinstein.
In an advisory about today’s news conference, Allred had promised to present a “new low” in the catalog of misdeeds by Weinstein, who has been fired from the company and expelled from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences as the scandal has metastasized.
A rep for Weinstein has repeatedly insisted that sexual contact with all parties was consensual.
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