Movie mogul Weinstein paid off sexual harassment cases for years

Two decades ago, Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein invited Ashley Judd to the Peninsula Beverly Hills hotel for what the young actress expected to be a business breakfast meeting. Instead, he had her sent up to his room, where he appeared in a bathrobe and asked if he could give her a massage or she could watch him shower, she recalled in an interview.

"How do I get out of the room as fast as possible without alienating Harvey Weinstein?" Judd said she remembers thinking.

In 2014, Weinstein invited Emily Nestor, who had worked just one day as a temporary employee, to the same hotel and made another offer: If she accepted his sexual advances, he would boost her career, according to accounts she provided to colleagues who sent them to Weinstein Co. executives. The following year, once again at the Peninsula, a female assistant said Weinstein badgered her into giving him a massage while he was naked, leaving her "crying and very distraught," wrote a colleague, Lauren O'Connor, in a searing memo asserting sexual harassment and other misconduct by their boss.

"There is a toxic environment for women at this company," O'Connor said in the letter, addressed to several executives at the company run by Weinstein.

An investigation by The New York Times found previously undisclosed allegations against Weinstein stretching over nearly three decades, documented through interviews with current and former employees and film industry workers, as well as legal records, emails and internal documents from the businesses he has run, Miramax and The Weinstein Co.

During that time, after being confronted with allegations including sexual harassment and unwanted physical contact, Weinstein has reached at least eight settlements with women, according to two company officials speaking on the condition of anonymity. Among the recipients, The Times found, were a young assistant in New York in 1990, an actress in 1997, an assistant in London in 1998, an Italian model in 2015 and O'Connor shortly after, according to records and those familiar with the agreements.

In a statement to The Times on Thursday afternoon, Weinstein said: "I appreciate the way I've behaved with colleagues in the past has caused a lot of pain, and I sincerely apologize for it. Though I'm trying to do better, I know I have a long way to go."

He added that he was working with therapists and planning to take a leave of absence to "deal with this issue head on."

Lisa Bloom, a lawyer advising Weinstein, said in a statement that "he denies many of the accusations as patently false." In comments to The Times earlier this week, Weinstein said that many claims in O'Connor's memo were "off base" and that they parted on good terms.

He and his representatives declined to comment on any of the settlements. But Weinstein said that in addressing employee concerns about workplace issues, "my motto is to keep the peace."

Though O'Connor had been writing only about a two-year period, her memo echoed other women's complaints. Weinstein required her to have casting discussions with aspiring actresses after they had private appointments in his hotel room, she said, her description matching those of other former employees. She suspected that she and other female Weinstein employees, she wrote, were being used to facilitate liaisons with "vulnerable women who hope he will get them work."

The allegations piled up even as Weinstein helped define popular culture. He has collected six best-picture Oscars and turned out a number of touchstones, from the films "Sex, Lies, and Videotape," "Pulp Fiction" and "Good Will Hunting" to the television show "Project Runway."

In 2015, the same year O'Connor wrote her memo, his company distributed "The Hunting Ground," a documentary about campus sexual assault. A longtime Democratic donor, he hosted a fundraiser for Hillary Clinton in his Manhattan home last year. He employed Malia Obama, the older daughter of former President Barack Obama, as an intern this year and recently helped endow a faculty chair at Rutgers University in Gloria Steinem's name. During the Sundance Film Festival in January, when Park City, Utah, held its version of the nationwide women's marches, Weinstein joined the parade.

"From the outside, it seemed golden — the Oscars, the success, the remarkable cultural impact," said Mark Gill, former president of Miramax Los Angeles, which was then owned by Disney. "But behind the scenes, it was a mess, and this was the biggest mess of all," he added, referring to Weinstein's treatment of women.

Dozens of Weinstein's former and current employees, from assistants to top executives, said they knew of inappropriate conduct while they worked for him. Only a handful said they ever confronted him. Most of the women involved in the Weinstein agreements collected between roughly $80,000 and $150,000, according to people familiar with the negotiations.

In the wake of O'Connor's 2015 memo, some Weinstein Co. board members and executives, including Weinstein's brother and longtime partner, Bob, 62, were alarmed about the allegations, according to several people who spoke on the condition of anonymity. In the end, though, board members were assured there was no need to investigate. After reaching a settlement with Harvey Weinstein, O'Connor withdrew her complaint and thanked him for the career opportunity he had given her.

"The parties made peace very quickly," Bloom said.

Through her lawyer, Nicole Page, O'Connor declined to be interviewed. In the memo, she explained how unnerved she was by what she witnessed or encountered while a literary scout and production executive at the company. "I am just starting out in my career, and have been and remain fearful about speaking up," O'Connor wrote. "But remaining silent is causing me great distress."

In speaking out about her hotel episode, Judd said in a recent interview, "Women have been talking about Harvey amongst ourselves for a long time, and it's simply beyond time to have the conversation publicly."

Nestor, a law and business school student, accepted Weinstein's breakfast invitation at the Peninsula because she did not want to miss an opportunity, she later told colleagues. After she arrived, he offered to help her career while boasting about a series of famous actresses he claimed to have slept with, according to accounts colleagues compiled after hearing her story and then sent on to company executives.

"She said he was very persistent and focused, though she kept saying no for over an hour," one internal document said. Nestor, who declined to comment for this article, refused his bargain, the records noted. The young woman chose not to report the episode to human resources personnel, but the allegations came to management's attention through other employees.

In interviews, eight women described varying behavior by Weinstein: appearing nearly or fully naked in front of them, requiring them to be present while he bathed or repeatedly asking for a massage or initiating one himself. The women, typically in their early or mid-20s and hoping to get a toehold in the film industry, said he could switch course quickly — meetings and clipboards one moment, intimate comments the next. One woman advised a peer to wear a parka when summoned for duty as a layer of protection against unwelcome advances.

In March 2015, Weinstein had invited Ambra Battilana, an Italian model and aspiring actress, to his TriBeCa office on a Friday evening to discuss her career. Within hours, she called the police. Battilana told them that Weinstein had grabbed her breasts after asking if they were real and put his hands up her skirt, the police report says.

The claims were taken up by the New York Police Department's Special Victims Squad and splashed across the pages of tabloids, along with reports that the woman had worked with investigators to secretly record a confession from Weinstein. The Manhattan district attorney's office later declined to bring charges.

But Weinstein made a payment to Battilana, according to people familiar with the settlement, speaking on the condition of anonymity about the confidential agreement. Battilana did not respond to requests for comment.

The public nature of the episode concerned some executives and board members of The Weinstein Co. (Harvey and Bob Weinstein together own 42 percent of the privately held business.) When several board members pressed Harvey Weinstein about it, he insisted that the woman had set him up, colleagues recalled.

After the episode, Lance Maerov, a board member, said he successfully pushed for a code of behavior for the company that included detailed language about sexual harassment.

Then O'Connor's memo hit, with page after page of detailed accusations. She was a valued employee — Weinstein described her as "fantastic," "a great person," "a brilliant executive" — so the complaint rattled top executives, including Bob Weinstein. When the board was notified of it by email, Maerov insisted that an outside lawyer determine whether the allegations were true, he said in an interview.

But the inquiry never happened. Harvey Weinstein had reached a settlement with O'Connor, she had withdrawn her complaint and there was no longer anything to investigate.

"Because this matter has been resolved and no further action is required, I withdraw my complaint," O'Connor wrote in an email to the head of human resources six days after sending her memo. She also wrote a letter to Weinstein thanking him for the opportunity to learn about the entertainment industry.

Rachel Abrams and William K. Rashbaum contributed reporting. Grace Ashford contributed research.