Posted on 10/09/2017 10:57:03 PM PDT by grundle
Full title: Harvey Weinstein's Lawyer Gave $10,000 To Manhattan DA After He Declined To File Sexual Assault Charges
Hollywood producer Harvey Weinstein’s lawyer delivered $10,000 to Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance, Jr. in 2015, in the months after Vance’s office decided not to prosecute Weinstein over sexual assault allegations, according to an International Business Times review of campaign finance documents. That contribution from attorney David Boies — who previously headlined a fundraiser for Vance — was a fraction of the more than $182,000 that Boies, his son and his law partners have delivered to the Democrat during his political career.
Boies has done legal work for Weinstein since at least 2005, and his website at his law firm says his clients include The Weinstein Company.
“David Boies did not represent Harvey Weinstein in 2015 during the criminal investigation,” Joan Vollero, communications director for Vance, told IBT in an email when asked about Boies’ campaign contributions.
Edward Evans, a spokesperson for the law firm Boies Schiller Flexner, said in an emailed statement: “David Boies has been a supporter of the District Attorney since long before 2015, including before he was first elected, and has never spoken to him about Harvey Weinstein.”
The revelations about the dropped Weinstein investigation come on the heels of a recent report documenting how Vance declined to prosecute Ivanka Trump and Donald Trump, Jr. after Trump’s attorney Marc Kasowitz gave Vance’s campaign $25,000. According to a report by ProPublica, WNYC and The New Yorker, Kasowitz made the donation, then met with Vance directly and then Vance dropped the case, overruling his own prosecutors.
In an email to IBT, Vance's campaign spokesperson Steve Sigmund said that just before Kasowitz met with Vance about the case, Vance's campaign returned the $25,000 donation. Kasowitz subsequently made an even larger donation to Vance after the district attorney decided not to prosecute the Trumps, but Sigmund said both the original donation and the second donation came when Kasowitz “had zero involvement in any cases before the District Attorney's office.”
The New York Times Thursday published a report detailing how multiple women have alleged Weinstein engaged in “sexual harassment and unwanted physical contact.” Variety reported that Weinstein “has retained star litigator David Boies as well as attorneys Lisa Bloom and Charles Harder in an effort to rebut the claims.” Weinstein issued an apology, but Bloom told the Times that the movie producer “denies many of the accusations as patently false.”
Among the allegations that the newspaper recounted was one in 2015, in which Italian model Abra Battilana accused Weinstein of groping her. Battilana contacted law enforcement officials, but in April of 2015, Vance’s office declined to bring charges against Weinstein, saying that “after analyzing the available evidence, including multiple interviews with both parties, a criminal charge is not supported.”
Soon after, Boies made a big donation to Vance: Campaign finance records show that Boies gave the district attorney’s campaign $10,000 on August 24, 2015. In all, Boies has given $55,000 to Vance’s campaigns since he first began running for office in 2008. Boies co-chaired a 2008 fundraiser for Vance. Since Vance began running for district attorney, Boies’ son Christopher has given Vance's campaigns $35,000. Boies' law firm partners who gave to Vance included Jonathan Schiller ($26,000), Nicholas Gravante ($4,000) and Robert Silver ($62,785). Silver passed away in 2015.
City & State noted that “Vance won office after campaigning on promises to pursue crimes directed at women and seek stronger penalties for perpetrators of intimate partner violence.”
This just keeps getting better and better, doesn't it?
corruption in NYC? and this is surprising why?
break out the grill and the kabobs!
identity politics will destroy the Dems and it has already begun.
Popcorn, anyone?
So it only costs $10,000 in NY City to get off serious charges? That’s actually pretty cheap if you ask me. The prosecutor should have asked for $100,000.
In a good and decent world, a lot of people (nearly all DEMs) would be punished for supporting this slime. At this point, I don’t have a warm fuzzy about it happening.
I expect to see more RAT Scandals to start dropping. For years Trump led the Left to believe he was on their side and he knows where all the bodies are buried.
You don’t even have to start peeling the onion to find corruption by democrats. It’s already there plain as day for anyone interested in exposing it. It’s what happens when no one ever holds them accountable.
Do I detect a whiff of scandal in the air? Corrupt Democrats, esp. Boies, handing out the election goodies to those who did them a good turn?
Gag me with a maggot! The whole damned Democrat Party and support system is as corrupt as hell and has been since the 60’s.
Nothing to see here, it’s a “New York thing”. Well, except for Trump.
#7. We and the conservative media should start referring to these RAT scandals when they are made public as “RAT DROPPING”.
That will convey the message loud and clearly to the masses.
“RAT DROPPINGS” - coming to Democrat Party officials and friends around election time.
Watch where you step!
I wonder how many millions that fat sleaze has spent over the years shutting people up and buying off corrupt cops/DA’s. I bet it’s in the several.
David Bois represented Al Gore in Bush v. Gore, over the 2000 election results.
Ahem... Only $10,000 was reported. Cash is still king.
B-b-but Trump!! Russia!!
Got little swamps all around the country.
So it sounds like Vance Jr. was charging Republicans more than Democrats to drop cases - can’t say that I blame him.
No mention that this bought off DA is the Son of Jimmah Carter SOS Cyrus Vance.
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