Harvey Weinstein Receives 15-Year Prison Sentence In New York

Harvey Weinstein has been sentenced to 15 years in prison in New York after being convicted of committing a criminal sexual act against former Project Runway assistant Miriam Haley.

Prosecutors had recommended 20 years of prison for Weinstein on the charge, with five years of post-release supervision, which was the same sentence imposed on this charge in 2020. His defense team had pushed for nine years, in consideration of Weinstein’s poor health, saying a longer term would make it more likely the 74-year-old dies in prison. The class B felony carries a maximum sentence of 25 years.

“I am not a perfect person. But I am a person who has made mistakes,” Weinstein said, reading his statement to the court. “Reflecting on all that has happened since 2017 has helped me recognize how my past conduct has negatively impacted others.”

Weinstein said he wanted to “apologize to anyone I may have hurt through my actions,” but he also continued to maintain his innocence, particularly as it pertained to Haley.

“The defendant doesn’t deserve a day less than his original sentence,” Manhattan Assistant District Attorney Nicole Blumberg said at the start of the hearing.

“Despite being found guilty of that offense, not once, but twice, the defendant has never shown an ounce of remorse,” she added, saying that he had instead engaged in victim blaming, and “unrelenting online harassment.”

This included negotiating a fee of $1.75 million for “assisting podcasters” to release videos on a “timeline that would benefit his defense” and “taint the jury pool,” while in prison, Blumberg claimed, seemingly in reference to an interview Weinstein conducted with Candace Owens in May 2025.

Weinstein has been in prison since 2020. That time is expected to apply towards his New York sentence. Judge Curtis Farber asked that the New York sentence run consecutive to his California sentence, but noted that California has the ultimate say.

“You will be remembered for the many films you brought to the silver screen,” Judge Curtis Farber said in sentencing Weinstein, adding that it pales in comparison to what he became “a sexual predator, the literal face of the Me Too movement.”

In the April 2025 trial, Haley testified that she first met Weinstein in 2004 at an afterparty for a film and later connected with him at the Cannes Film Festival in 2006, where Weinstein offered her work as a production assistant on Project Runway. That same year, she said that he forced oral sex on her at his Manhattan apartment and physically held her down on the bed as she protested.

This was the second time Haley had testified. Weinstein was initially convicted in New York in 2020 of raping Jessica Mann, an aspiring actress, as well as sexually assaulting Haley. At the time, Weinstein received a 23-year sentence. That conviction was overturned in 2024 when the New York Court of Appeals ruled that the trial judge incorrectly allowed other women whose allegations were not charged in the case to testify.

Prosecutors pursued the retrial in 2025, where Weinstein was again convicted of the criminal sexual act against Haley, and cleared of a similar charge against former model Kaja Sokola, who was new to the case. The jury in that trial was unable to reach a verdict on the charge related to Mann and a mistrial was declared. Prosecutors eventually dismissed the charge related to Mann, who did not wish to testify again, which paved the way for the sentencing.

“This is the second witness impact statement I’m giving related to the crime committed against me by Harvey Weinstein,” Haley said Wednesday. “I trust that it will be my final one.”

She went on to describe the decision to testify twice as traumatizing, saying she considered dropping out many times, as she felt as if she was the one on trial, after enduring tough cross-examination, press attention and online hostility, in addition to the trauma from the sexual assault, which she said will have her “looking over my shoulder for years to come.”

“For every person who gets scared, tired, intimidated and shamed I knew those were the reasons I had to keep going,” Haley said while tearing up. Weinstein, sitting at the defense table in a wheelchair, did not look at her.

Mann and Sokola were both sitting in the court gallery Wednesday, alongside Mann, her attorney Gloria Allred, known for representing women in high-profile cases, and Manhattan D.A. Alvin Bragg.

Weinstein also faces a 16-year prison sentence in California, which was set to begin after his initial New York sentence. However, a state appeals court has ruled that Weinstein be resentenced in California. A date has not yet been set for the resentencing. Weinstein’s team has also petitioned the California supreme court for review of the conviction.

As the court cases have been underway, Weinstein has been imprisoned at Rikers, but has been hospitalized a number of times and has said that his health has been poor. He suffers from numerous conditions, including bone marrow cancer, chronic myeloid leukemia and coronary artery disease. On Wednesday, his attorney, Jacob Kaplan, said that the treatment for his cancer exacerbates his heart condition and will continue to lead to hospitalizations.

If he were to get out of prison, Weinstein told the court that he wanted to open a foundation to help rehabilitate inmates after they’re released from prison.

“I want to live outside these walls,” he said Wednesday. “I’m not a violent man. I ask for mercy.”