Massage therapist opens up to ‘friend’ Mel Gibson about alleged assault during massage with Harvey Weinstein

• A key Harvey Weinstein accuser testified this week at the disgraced Hollywood mogul’s Los Angeles trial.
• The woman, identified as Jane Doe 3, initially kept the alleged assault to herself, she testified.
• But she eventually revealed the incident to an unlikely and famous confidant: actor Mel Gibson.

Actor Mel Gibson once acted as a trusted confidant to one of Harvey Weinstein’s accusers, the woman testified in court this week during the disgraced tycoon’s criminal trial for rape.

Los Angeles County prosecutors have charged Weinstein with 11 counts of sexual assault stemming from allegations by five different women who accused the former producer of abusing them at Los Angeles hotels between 2004 and 2013.

Weinstein is already serving a 23-year sentence in a New York prison following an East Coast trial, but faces an additional life sentence before the West Coast trial. He denied the charges against him and pleaded not guilty.

The five women are expected to testify against Weinstein, along with four ‘prior wrongdoing witnesses’, whose testimony does not directly relate to the criminal charges but may be considered by the jury as prosecutors try to establish the behavior alleged Weinstein.

One of the main accusers in the case spoke on Wednesday where she described the alleged assault. The woman, identified as Jane Doe 3, worked as a massage therapist who catered to high-profile and famous clients, which is how she ended up alone in a hotel room with Weinstein in 2010, a- she testified, according to the trial group report.

After 40 minutes on the table, Weinstein abruptly stopped the massage, she testified, saying he was done. She went to the bathroom to wash her hands when Weinstein barged in naked and began to masturbate, she testified. Jane Doe 3 said she asked him to leave, telling him his behavior was inappropriate.

“He said, ‘Look at me, tell me how big my dick is,'” she testified, according to the pool report.

He pushed her against a wall and began to feel her chest under her bra, she said. Despite her pleas, Weinstein continued to touch her and masturbate, she said. In the end, he tried to play the incident off as usual, Jane Doe 3 said, according to the pool report.

For months, she said she kept the assault to herself for fear that speaking out would impact her career and her access to prominent massage clients. But she eventually revealed the alleged attack to an unlikely confidante.

Jane Doe 3 said she gave actor Mel Gibson a massage when he brought up a movie he could work on with Weinstein. She said she began to “freak out,” asking how Gibson could want to work with Weinstein. When he asked her about her reaction, she burst into tears and opened up about the attack, she said.

“He was the first person I finally talked to about what happened,” she said, according to the pool report. “I told him he had sexually assaulted me, but I didn’t want to go into all the details. I was embarrassed and humiliated.”

Gibson asked if she wanted to call the police. He also suggested that she speak with one of her friends, she testified.

A representative for Gibson did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.

The prosecution said they plan to call Gibson as a witness in the case, but Weinstein’s defense attorney said he would appeal to the actor’s checkered and anti-Semitic history if he finds out. was speaking.

During Thursday’s cross-examination, Weinstein’s attorney, Mark Werksman, pushed Jane Doe 3 to explain why she returned to massage Weinstein several times after the initial incident and entered into discussions with his publishing company about of a possible naked massage book.

“Your story is like the US economy, with an inflation rate of 8%,” Werksman said. “You didn’t want to kill the book market and tell Weinstein, ‘Bad boy, no more massages,’ did you?”

Werksman claimed the story of Jane Doe 3 changed over meetings with the Los Angeles County District Attorney’s office and authorities between 2016 and 2020.

“That’s one of the reasons I didn’t want to come forward,” she said. “Because it’s embarrassing.”