Harvey Weinstein’s lawyers began their defense at his rape trial in Manhattan with testimony intended to discredit one of the prosecution’s strongest witnesses: the actress Annabella Sciorra, who claims Mr. Weinstein attacked her in the early 1990s.
The defense team also called a cognitive psychologist who is an expert on false, repressed and unreliable memories, to cast doubt on his six accusers, all of whom have testified to sexual assaults that happened years ago. “It doesn’t take a Ph.D. to know that memories fades over time,” the psychologist, Elizabeth Loftus, said in her testimony.
On Thursday, Manhattan prosecutors rested their case against Mr. Weinstein, the once-powerful Hollywood producer, after three weeks of testimony from more than two dozen witnesses, including the six women who said he raped or sexually assaulted them.
Mr. Weinstein’s lawyers began calling witnesses on Thursday afternoon to support their claim that his encounters with the women had been consensual and, in some instances, transactional to advance their careers.
The second prong of the defense is to suggest that the women’s memories and recollections are skewed given the passage of time.
Mr. Weinstein, 67, has pleaded not guilty in State Supreme Court in Manhattan to five felony charges, including rape, criminal sexual assault and predatory sexual assault. If convicted on the last charge, he could be sentenced to up to life in prison.
The trial is largely seen as a pivotal moment for the #MeToo movement, the widespread rebuke of decades of sexual harassment and abuse by men against women in the workplace. The jury of seven men and five women have been asked to consider complex issues around consent and power.
The main charges in the indictment rest on the testimony of just two women: Miriam Haley, a former production assistant who said the producer forced oral sex on her at his home in 2006, and Jessica Mann, a former actress who accused him of raping her in a Midtown Manhattan hotel in 2013.
The defense has focused on evidence that suggests Ms. Mann and Ms. Haley maintained relationships, including consensual sexual encounters, with the producer long after he allegedly assaulted them. Mr. Weinstein’s lawyers used the women’s own words, documented in dozens of emails, to support their theory.
Ms. Sciorra was added to the criminal case late last summer to further support the charge of predatory sexual assault, which requires that prosecutors prove Mr. Weinstein committed a serious sex crime against at least two women. Though the state statute of limitations bars a rape charge based on her allegation, her testimony can be used as part of the predatory sexual assault charge.
Ms. Sciorra, 59, is the most challenging witness for the defense to discredit. Unlike Ms. Mann and Ms. Haley, she did not maintain a relationship with Mr. Weinstein after the alleged rape.
She testified that Mr. Weinstein pushed his way into her apartment after giving her a ride home from a dinner party, then raped her even as she punched and kicked him. She said that when she tried to confront him about what happened a couple of weeks later, he menaced her, saying, “This remains between you and I.”
But the defense’s first witness was Paul Feldsher, a writer and former talent agent who has known both Mr. Weinstein and Ms. Sciorra for decades.
Mr. Feldsher testified that shortly after the alleged attack, during a long walk through Manhattan, Ms. Sciorra characterized her encounter with Mr. Weinstein as something far less serious than rape, calling it a “crazy thing” she had done with the producer.
“My understanding was that she fooled around with him,” he said.
In her own testimony, Ms. Sciorra, best known for her roles in “Jungle Fever,” and “The Sopranos,” had denied saying anything like that to Mr. Feldsher.
Mr. Feldsher described himself as a defender of Mr. Weinstein, saying that he had kept in touch with the producer even after scores of women came forward to accuse him of sexual misconduct.
He gave an unvarnished portrait of Mr. Weinstein on the stand. He said he believed his friend was a sex addict and had “dated a lot women,” but also noted that he had never seen Mr. Weinstein act “improperly” toward a woman.
He acknowledged that Mr. Weinstein could be “extremely aggressive” in his work life. And once, he admitted, he sent Mr. Weinstein a text saying, “Your appetite and ambition for the things you want — a script a movie and yes a girl — are to put it mildly voracious.” But he also said that he did not believe Mr. Weinstein was capable of the crimes he had been charged with.
Ms. Loftus, the cognitive psychologist, testified on Friday that a person’s memory can change overtime.
“Five years is quite a long time where there would be quite significant memory decay,” said Ms. Loftus, who has testified in the trials of O.J. Simpson and of the officers accused in the beating of Rodney King, as well as in litigation involving Michael Jackson and Martha Stewart.
“What about after 27 years?” asked Diana Fabi Samson, one of Mr. Weinstein’s lawyers, referring to the amount of time that has passed since Mr. Weinstein allegedly attacked Ms. Sciorra. “That’s an extraordinary period of time,” Ms. Loftus said.
Ms. Loftus added that factors like stress and alcohol or drugs can affect a person’s memory. She said leading questions by investigators and extensive media coverage on a subject “can cause a contamination and alteration in memory.”
Ms. Fabi Samson asked if it was possible that someone could create false memories as they try to recall an event to support a criminal prosecution. Ms. Loftus said some people would “want to try to remember more,” and that could lead “us to try to fill in the gaps — it starts to feel like memory.”
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