A judge has approved major changes to the legal team representing Harvey Weinstein in his rape and sexual assault case.
The judge’s approval allows the disgraced Hollywood mogul to swap out his bulldog New York City defence attorney for a four-person team that’s full of courtroom star power.
The film producer was in court in Manhattan — along with new lawyers Jose Baez, Ronald Sullivan and Duncan Levin, and former lawyer Benjamin Brafman — as Judge James Burke approved the switch.
“Welcome to the New York State Supreme Court,” Mr Burke told Weinstein’s new lawyers.
Weinstein and Mr Brafman announced last week they had “agreed to part ways amicably.”
The changes have arrived a month after they lost a hard-fought bid to get the case thrown out.
Weinstein’s trial is tentatively scheduled for May.
He is charged with raping a woman in 2013 and performing a forcible sex act on a different woman in 2006. He denies all allegations of nonconsensual sex.
Weinstein’s other new lawyer, Pamela Robillard Mackey, didn’t attend Friday’s hearing because she was out of the country.
Mr Baez is perhaps the best-known name of the four. He first gained fame for representing Casey Anthony, the Florida mom whose televised trial in 2011 ended in an acquittal on charges of killing her young daughter.
Actress Rose McGowan, one of the first of dozens of women to accuse Weinstein of sexual misconduct, blasted Mr Baez and Mr Sullivan for agreeing to represent Weinstein after they defended her in a drug case last year. She called it a “major conflict of interest.”
The two attorneys said in a statement that Ms McGowan’s case had nothing to do with Weinstein and that they were certain there was no conflict.
Ms McGowan, who pleaded no contest, has accused Weinstein of having someone plant the cocaine that Virginia authorities said they found in her wallet.
Asked while leaving the courtroom if he’s happy with his new legal team, Weinstein responded “absolutely.”
“I wish him the best of luck,” Mr Brafman said outside the courthouse.
The next hearing in the case is scheduled for 8 March.
Additional reporting by AP
