VIDEO: Harvey Weinstein Charged With Rape In NYC

TRIBECA, NY — The disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein surrendered to police Friday morning at the NYPD's 1st Precinct in Tribeca, the NYPD said. Weinstein was booked on charges of rape, criminal sex act, sex abuse and sexual misconduct stemming from incidents involving two women, police said.

He was taken to Manhattan Criminal Court and arraigned. He did not enter a plea and was released on $1 million cash bail. He is facing a maximum of 25 years in prison if convicted on any of the charges.

Dressed in a blazer, blue sweater and white shirt, Weinstein said nothing as his lawyer, Benjamin Brafman, escorted him out of the courtroom. He left through a back door, avoiding the phalanx of reporters waiting on the street out front.

Weinstein's surrender capped a months-long investigation by the NYPD and the Manhattan District Attorney's Office after news reports revealed that Weinstein allegedly raped, sexually assaulted and harassed dozens of women over the course of his glitzy career as a film producer.

"The NYPD thanks these brave survivors for their courage to come forward and seek justice," the NYPD said in a statement.

The criminal sex act charge stems from Weinstein's assault of Lucia Evans, a former aspiring actress who told The New Yorker that Weinstein forced her to perform oral sex on him at his Tribeca office in 2004.

"At a certain point, you have to think about the greater good of humanity, of womankind," Evans told The New Yorker on Thursday of her decision to press charges against Weinstein.

Weinstein is also accused of raping another woman in March 2013 at a Midtown hotel, according to a criminal complaint in the case.

The actress Paz de la Huerta has publicly accused Weinstein of raping her twice in 2010. Robert Boyce, the NYPD's former chief of detectives, said last year that the police believed de la Huerta's story to be credible.

"Today’s charges reflect significant progress in this active, ongoing investigation," Manhattan District Attorney Cyrus Vance Jr. said in a statement.

The NYPD had also investigated Weinstein in 2015 for allegedly groping the Italian model Ambra Battilana, but Manhattan prosecutors reportedly decided not to prosecute the case.

Federal prosecutors have also started their own sex crimes investigation into Weinstien, The Wall Street Journal reported this week.

Weinstein was issued an order of protection forbidding him from contact with the alleged victims. He was told he cannot travel outside New York or Connecticut, where he has homes. He has to wear a monitoring device which allows him to be tracked 24 hours a day.

Weinstein's arraignment turned Manhattan Criminal Court into a media circus. Several court officers closely guarded the packed arraignment courtroom, at one point stopping a woman from entering to get her files. A man exiting well before Weinstein told anxious reporters to stand down because he was "nobody famous."

Some of Weinstein's accusers celebrated the fact that he'll finally face justice.

"Today Harvey Weinstein will take his first step on his inevitable descent to hell," Asia Argento, an actress who told The New Yorker that Weinstein forcibly performed oral sex on her, wrote on Twitter. "We, the women, finally have real hope for justice."

(Lead image: Harvey Weinstein leaves court Friday morning. By Noah Manskar/Patch)