Can’t say it comes to much of a surprise to us that Allen & Overy were / are far more aware of what Weinstein had been up to than they are leading others to believe.
Roll on Friday report…..
Allen & Overy has been dragged into the Harvey Weinstein scandal after one of his victims criticised the manner in which it negotiated her non-disclosure agreement while acting for Weinstein’s company, Miramax. Meanwhile, ex-Miramax staff told RollOnFriday that they believed the firm “knew exactly” what the serial abuser was up to.
In an interview with the Financial Times, Zelda Perkins, who worked as Weinstein’s assistant in London during the 1990s, said the producer repeatedly sexually harassed her. Perkins signed an NDA in 1998 in exchange for a £250,000 payment which she split with a co-complainant. Sources who wished to remain anonymous told RollOnFriday that the other woman, who does not wish to be named, bore the brunt of the mogul’s attentions and that the pair decided to instruct solicitors after the second woman endured a “Clintonesque” encounter with Weinstein.
Rather than taking the money and running, the two women instructed their legal team, comprising solicitors from Simons Muirhead & Burton and a barrister now at Doughty Street Chambers, to include several provisions in the NDA to protect the women left behind. They included requirements that Weinstein would seek therapy and an overhaul of Miramax’s HR procedures. A source with knowledge of the situation told RollOnFriday that if one of the recently-revealed accusations of assault is accurate, Weinstein probably breached the terms of the NDA within nine months of its execution, 19 years before Perkins did so by going public. The source suggested that when the full NDA emerges, it will show that it is highly likely that Miramax also breached its obligations.
Unfortunately there’s a lot more of this at http://www.rollonfriday.com/TheNews/EuropeNews/tabid/58/Id/5385/fromTab/36/currentIndex/0/Default.aspx
