Harvey Weinstein Retrial Ends in Mistrial

A New York jury in Harvey Weinstein‘s rape case has deadlocked after several days of deliberation, leading to a mistrial.

The case was declared a mistrial after three days of deliberations, in which jurors were unable to reach a verdict. This is the third time Weinstein has been tried for a charge of third-degree rape; Judge Curtis Farber gave prosecutors 30 days to decide whether he will be tried a fourth time.

Weinstein, 74, was initially convicted of raping actress Jessica Mann in 2020, but a judge overturned the verdict. The second time it went to trial, the jury couldn’t reach a verdict. The third trial began on April 21 at Manhattan’s State Supreme Court with Justice Curtis Farber presiding. The New York Times reports that nearly 20 witnesses gave testimony.

The charge is a Class E felony and carries a maximum sentence of four years in prison in New York. Last June, the jury delivered split results on two charges of a criminal sexual act, finding him guilty of one but not guilty of another.

In May 2025, Mann told the jury that she had met Weinstein at a party in 2012 or 2013. Staying in touch with him, he started asking her for a massage. She initially said no to his sexual advances, but eventually relented and performed oral sex on him because he told her he wouldn’t let her leave the room unless he let her “do something” to her. In March 2013, she claimed he pressured her into sex and she “just gave up.”

Mann had to tell her story again on April 28. The New York Times reported that she avoided eye contact with Weinstein. “I said no over and over, and I tried to leave,” she told the jury, occasionally through tears. “He was just treating me like he owned me.” Her testimony lasted five days.

What was different this time is Weinstein’s lawyers produced a note she’d written two days after she claimed to have been assaulted, in which she wondered if she’d “let myself become emotionally attached to someone.” The Times reports it was the first time the note was referenced in any of the three trials, and it did not mention rape. Mann told the jury that the note showed how she “struggled with some of the decisions that [she] was making that were different than what I was raised with.”

Weinstein’s legal team for the retrial included Jacob Kaplan, who is also representing Luigi Mangione, as well as Marc Agnifilo and Teny Geragos, who defended Sean “Diddy” Combs against sex trafficking and racketeering charges. Arthur Aidala, who previously represented Weinstein, also continued to do so.

In closing arguments, one of Weinstein’s lawyers, Agnifilo, described Weinstein’s sex with Mann as consensual and claimed he “helped her in every conceivable way,” according to the Times. Their relationship, he said, was on-again, off-again, and he believes she saw an opportunity when Weinstein was accused of sexual misconduct in 2017 and decided to accuse him of assault. “Is she lying? Yeah, maybe,” Agnifilo told the jury. He insisted, though, “there’s affirmative evidence that it did not happen.” During these closing arguments, the Times reported that a male juror rolled his eyes repeatedly.

Nicole Blumberg, an assistant district attorney, told the jury that consensual relationships do not preclude rape. “Whether you’re in a hotel room with somebody or not, you have the right to say no,” she said, according to the Times. “Jessica Mann said no over and over and over again.” She described Agnifilo’s arguments as “the ultimate victim blaming.”

That retrial was the result of the New York Court of Appeals overturning Weinstein’s 2020 conviction and the accompanying 23-year prison sentence, with the majority opinion stating that prosecutors should not have been allowed to place accusers whose allegations were not part of the charges on the witness stand. More than 100 women have made accusations of sexual misconduct against Weinstein since 2017.

“Coming forward cost me everything: my privacy, my safety,” Mann said in a statement to Rolling Stone after the jury failed to reach a verdict on the charge. “I laid bare my trauma, my shame – everything I’d tried to bury just to keep living. Still, I stood up and told the truth. Again and again. Harvey hides behind PR firms, lawyers, spy agencies contracted to intimidate. I’ve had only my voice.”

In January, Weinstein and his lawyer told Judge Curtis Farber that he would consider a plea deal if it meant that he could serve a sentence concurrently with what he’s already serving. A few months later, he denied accusations of rape in an interview.

Weinstein still faces 16 years in prison in California after being found guilty of rape there. He is appealing the conviction.