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Rose McGowan is suing Harvey Weinstein with allegations that the disgraced movie mogul recruited a network of attorneys, media power players, and even spies to keep her from going public with allegations that Weinstein raped her.
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McGowan was one of the earliest and most vocal women to speak out against Weinstein, who has now been accused of sexual misconduct by more than 80 women. In 1997, McGowan reportedly received $100,000 to settle with Weinstein, who she said raped her at the Sundance Film Festival that year.
But in a lawsuit filed Wednesday, McGowan alleges that Weinstein roped in prominent lawyers David Boies and Lisa Bloom as well as hired the “international spy agency Black Cube,” as the lawsuit describes it, into his efforts to discredit her.
Boies, Bloom, their law firms, and Black Cube are all named as defendants in the lawsuit, which was filed in federal court in California and includes claims of racketeering, fraud, and invasion of privacy. McGowan previously asked for $6 million to settle the matter, according to the Hollywood Reporter.
“This case is about a diabolical and illegal effort by one of America’s most powerful men and his representatives to silence sexual-assault victims,” the lawsuit alleges. “And it is about the courageous women and journalists who persisted to reveal the truth.”
Weinstein first started targeting McGowan in 2016, after she tweeted she had been raped by somebody who distributed her movie, according to the lawsuit. Soon afterward, Boies, Weinstein’s longtime associate, allegedly hired Black Cube to squash any Weinstein-related negative publicity, on Weinstein’s behalf.
A Black Cube operative going by the name of Diana Filip eventually befriended McGowan, through posing as an advocate for women, and secretly recorded their conversations, according to the lawsuit. McGowan says she also let Filip read some of her memoir.
This isn’t the first time that Black Cube has been linked to Weinstein. In November 2017, the New Yorker reported that Weinstein used their operatives to look into women who might accuse him of sexual misconduct, as well as the journalists reporting out those allegations.
McGowan alleges that Roy Price, then the head of Amazon Studios, also contributed to Weinstein’s purported plan to silence her, by purchasing a screenplay McGowan had written simply to kill it. Price is not named as a defendant in the lawsuit.
The lawsuit accuses Bloom, the daughter of women’s rights lawyer Gloria Allred and a celebrity civil rights attorney in her own right, of trying to destroy McGowan’s reputation. Weinstein had optioned a book written by Bloom and eventually retained her at a rate of $895 per hour, according to “She Said,” a book by New York Times reporters Jodi Kantor and Megan Twohey.
“I feel equipped to help you against the Roses of the world, because I have represented so many of them,” Bloom wrote in a December 2016 email to Weinstein, according to “She Said.” “They start out impressive, bold women, but the more one presses for evidence, the weaknesses and lies are revealed.”
Bloom later told the reporters that representing Weinstein was a “colossal mistake.” But this week, Bloom’s attorney, Eric George, told Variety that McGowan’s decision to include Bloom in her lawsuit was “inexcusable.”
“Facts matter,” George said. “There is simply no credible factual or legal basis for her claims against my client. We look forward to our day in court to set the record straight.”
Weinstein’s lawyer Phyllis Kupferstein also denounced the complaint.
“Once and for all, Rose McGowan will be shown to be what she is; a publicity seeker looking for money,” she told the Hollywood Reporter. “From the moment she sought a multi-million dollar payout in return for not making these baseless allegations, which we rejected, we knew that she was waiting for an opportune time to begin this. We will demonstrate that this case has no legal merit.”
Weinstein is now awaiting trial on charges related to allegations of sexual assault. He has previously denied all allegations of nonconsensual sex.
Boies’ law firm did not immediately respond to a VICE News request for comment.
Cover image: In this Oct. 27, 2017, file photo, actress Rose McGowan speaks at the inaugural Women’s Convention in Detroit. (AP Photo/Paul Sancya, File)
