The woman at the center of Harvey Weinstein’s third New York rape trial took the stand Monday, eliciting tears from the jury as she told them about an abusive childhood and the movie mogul forcing himself on her in a Los Angeles hotel room.
Jessica Mann, who described herself as an aspiring actress who had moved from a religious rural Washington town to Los Angeles, said Weinstein invited her and her friend to multiple film industry events after meeting her at a party where he told her he was “interested in [her] look.” After inviting Mann and her friend to drinks after one party, he told them they would be perfect to star in an upcoming film of his and that they should go up to his hotel room to get the scripts for it.
Once the two women got into his hotel suite, Mann testified, Weinstein called her over to him, then grabbed her by the elbow and forced her into a separate room, closing the door and started “aggressively” kissing her. She resisted the advance, telling him she was only sexual with people with whom she had a relationship.
Mann testified that Weinstein then told her he would not let her leave until she let him do something to her.
He allegedly led Mann to the room’s bed and performed oral sex on her. She said she faked an orgasm as a way to “appease” him, as that seemed like the best way to get him to stop, Mann told the jury.
The encounter with Weinstein left her “confused and sick,” Mann said — particularly because it ended with a threatening warning.
“He told me, ‘My friends go far, and my enemies don’t step a foot in this town,’” Mann said. “Obviously I didn’t want to piss him off … He’d just talked about this movie with us … and I was really confused about what had happened.”
The testimony comes in a retrial stemming from a 2025 jury being unable to return a verdict on whether Weinstein raped Mann in a New York City hotel room when the two traveled across the country in March 2013 for a meeting with a talent agent he’d set up for her.
Mann is expected to testify about the alleged rape that took place in that New York City hotel tomorrow. It is that conduct that Weinstein is charged with in this trial.
Weinstein’s first New York rape trial took place six years ago, in the case that is widely credited with sparking the “#MeToo” movement. He was found guilty of raping Mann in 2020, but his attorneys appealed, resulting in the 2025 retrial that ended with a hung jury, which resulted in the current trial.
Weinstein has now been accused of rape and sexual assault by over 80 women.
Weinstein’s current defense team, two of whom represented the real estate hotshot Alexander brothers in their recent federal sex trafficking trial, have argued that the encounter in New York and others were consensual, and that Mann wanted to have a relationship with the powerful man in the industry she was trying to break into.
The district attorney has said that Weinstein was pressuring Mann, he had total power over her in their relationship and that reactions she received from her parents after she was assaulted by a man in her church in her childhood influenced her to keep quiet for so many years.
Mann told the jury Monday that she was sexually and physically abused by a man about 10 years older than her in her evangelical church when she was 16 years old. When she told her mother and stepfather, both said things that left her “hurt.”
“My mom said it would be a ‘he said versus she said’ situation,” Mann said. “My stepfather told me it was my fault for turning him on.”
“We just thought it was going to become a battle,” Mann said on why she didn’t report the abuse. “I just remember when I was told it was my fault, that pretty much shut me down. I didn’t want to talk about it.”
Mann said she was driven to self-harm as a result of the trauma.
When she ended up in a physically abusive relationship in her early 20s, Mann said her father told her it was “happening to her” because she was “living in sin” and “these are the consequences of the choices that [she was] making,” leaving her feeling “abandoned.”
The district attorney is expected to continue the line of argument that Mann was a vulnerable young woman whom Weinstein took advantage of.
If you or someone you know is a victim of sexual assault, help is available by calling the National Sexual Assault Hotline at 1-800-656-4673.
