Do we like Harvey Weinstein?
Our score: 0 out of 10. Courts in New York and California have convicted him of sexual crimes against women, and he has been sentenced to prison for them.
Weinstein built Miramax into a Hollywood power, and for years that power was the story. After the 2017 reporting broke, director Peter Jackson told a New Zealand outlet that Miramax had warned his team off Mira Sorvino and Ashley Judd, and said that in hindsight it was likely a smear campaign. A Weinstein spokesperson said Miramax “had no input into the casting whatsoever.”
The New York case went round the track twice. He was sentenced to 23 years in 2020, but that conviction was overturned on appeal in 2024. A jury found him guilty again in 2025 over the 2006 assault of Miriam Haley, and acquitted him on a second charge involving Kaja Sokola.
On 23 September 2026 he was sentenced to 15 years for the Haley assault. Separately, a California jury convicted him in 2022 of rape and sexual assault, and a 16-year term followed. In June 2026 an appeals court upheld that conviction but vacated the sentence, so he will be resentenced there.
On the harm test, we found nothing on LGBTQ+ people or the planet either way, so this one turns on the courts' findings about his conduct towards women. He has denied criminal wrongdoing, and in January told a judge “I never assaulted anyone”. Two juries disagreed with him on the counts they decided, and his reps say he will keep appealing.
Not everything went against the prosecution's side in a clean line, and that's fair to say. A third New York trial over Jessica Mann's 2013 allegation ended in a mistrial in May 2026. She then dropped the charge rather than face another retrial, and prosecutors said they would not pursue a fourth trial. That outcome is not an acquittal, and it doesn't touch the convictions that stand.
In March he gave a jailhouse interview describing life at Rikers Island as harsh, saying he spends about 23 hours a day in his cell and wants to return to state prison. The coverage carries no comment from him about the allegations themselves. It's an interview about his own situation.