Ever since the separate investigations by the New York Times and the New Yorker revealed decades of sexual harassment, assault, and rape allegations against Harvey Weinstein, additional details and developments have kept coming without fail. In early November, the NYPD announced it had “an actual case” against Weinstein regarding Paz De La Huerta’s accusations against him. More recently, The Guardian and the Observer obtained and published a startling list of 91 names for private investigators to target in various smear campaigns. And then there’s Harvey’s brother and fellow Hollywood mogul, Bob Weinstein.
According to Ronan Farrow’s latest report in the New Yorker, Bob didn’t simply know about Harvey’s use of extensive nondisclosure agreements and financial settlements as hush money. He helped his brother hide two particular settlements by letting him withdraw roughly $600,000 of his own money from a personal bank account. The amount in question was “to be split between two female employees in England who accused Harvey Weinstein of sexual harassment and assault,” and in taking the money from Bob’s account, Harvey was able to “conceal” the payments from Miramax, its parent company Disney, and his wife.
In an interview with Farrow, Bob Weinstein claimed, “I only know what Harvey told me, and basically what he said was he was fooling around with two women and they were asking for money.” Noting that Harvey “didn’t want his wife to find out,” the brother claimed “he asked me if I could write a check, and so I did, but there was nothing to indicate any kind of sexual harassment.” According to a former senior executive at Miramax who also spoke with Farrow, however, “it was implausible that Bob Weinstein did not know about the nature of the allegations” since they were “reported to the company” they co-owned.
To make matters worse for Bob, this latest New Yorker report adds further credence to the initial New York Times story that indicated his foreknowledge of relevant matters. It also flies in the face of comments he made during an extensive interview with The Hollywood Reporter in October when he decried Harvey’s actions as “indefensible and crazy” and said he should “get the justice that he deserves.” When asked about the Times report’s claims regarding his awareness of the matter, Bob declared, “No way. No F-in way was I aware that that was the type of predator that he was.”
(Via New Yorker)