The Disney bosses defend themselves in response to the lawsuit that named the company a co-defendant in alleged sexual assault allegations against the disgraced movie mogul.

• May 30, 2020

AceShowbiz - Harvey Weinstein and Walt Disney Company bosses have pledged to defend themselves vigorously against a new underage rape lawsuit.

The disgraced former Miramax film executive was accused of raping four more women, including a then 17-year-old, in a new lawsuit filed in New York Supreme Court on Thursday, May 28, 2020, with Disney cited as a co-defendant in the case.

"Mr. Weinstein intends to defend against the claims filed anonymously against him yesterday," the producer's civil cases lawyer Imran H. Ansari said in a statement to Deadline on Friday, before referring to legal statutes of limitation for reporting rape as a defence for his client. "Some of these claims, including those alleged to have occurred in the 1980s and 1990s, may be barred by the applicable statute of limitations, and not subject to any exceptions under the law, as these plaintiffs do not appear to be complainants in Mr. Weinstein's criminal case."

Legal reps for the Walt Disney Company, named as a defendant due to past corporate dealings with Weinstein's Miramax company, have also hit back at the lawsuit.

"There is absolutely no legal basis for claims against the company, and we will defend against them vigorously," a statement reads.

Harvey is currently behind bars in New York serving a 23-year sentence after he was convicted of a string of sex crimes in March.

In the new filing, four women have stepped forward with accusations he raped them on four separate occasions between 1984 and 2013. One of the rape accusers alleged the molestation against her occurred in 1994, when she was 17 years old.

The new lawsuit is ongoing.