Scotland Yard to investigate five more allegations against producer as Hollyoaks actor Lysette Anthony says he attacked her in 1980s

This article is more than 2 years old

This article is more than 2 years old

Scotland Yard is looking into five allegations of sexual assault by three women against the disgraced Hollywood movie producer Harvey Weinstein in Britain.

A team of officers has been established to look into the alleged crimes, which are said to have taken place in London in 1992, 2010, 2011 and 2015, as well as an allegation of sexual assault previously passed on to the Metropolitan police by Merseyside police, which relates to the late 1980s.

The latest allegation of assault was made on Sunday, the Met said in a statement yesterday. They came as the organisation behind the Oscars expelled Weinstein.

“On 11 October, Merseyside police referred an allegation of sexual assault to the Metropolitan Police Service,” a Scotland Yard spokesman said. “It is alleged that a man sexually assaulted a woman in the late 1980s in west London. On 14 October, further allegations were made against the same man. It is alleged that the man sexually assaulted a woman in Westminster in 2010 and 2011, and in Camden in 2015.” The cases involve two different victims.

A third woman said on Sunday that Weinstein assaulted her in 1992 in London.

“Officers from the Met’s child abuse and sexual offences command are investigating the allegations,” the statement continued. “There has been no arrest at this stage.”

The development, revealed by a spokesman for the Metropolitan police, came as two separate claims of rape were made against Weinstein in the UK on Sunday, one by the Hollyoaks actor Lysette Anthony, and another by an unnamed former Miramax employee using the pseudonym Sarah Smith that relates to the 1990s.

Anthony told the Sunday Times that Weinstein had become a friend after they met in 1982, but in the late 1980s he had raped her at her home in London.

The paper reported that she gave video evidence to officers at a central London police station on Thursday.

Anthony, 54, said she met the producer when she starred in the 1982 sci-fi film Krull and the alleged assault occurred a few years later. She said it was a “pathetic, revolting” attack that had left her “disgusted and embarrassed”.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Lysette Anthony said the producer had raped her at her home in London in the late 1980s. Photograph: David Fisher/Rex/Shutterstock

“Smith” alleged in the Mail on Sunday that in 1992 she was raped by Weinstein in the basement flat below Miramax’s offices in Fulham, south-west London. The paper reported that she was also considering making a formal complaint to police.

Through his spokeswoman, Weinstein has “unequivocally denied” any allegations of non-consensual sex.

Once a fixture of downtown New York, Weinstein is now a ghost amid scandal Read more

The UK claims follow several allegations of rape made by actors in the US against Weinstein, all of which he has strenuously denied.

Meanwhile, Eva Green, who starred in the James Bond film Casino Royale, has said she felt “shocked and disgusted” by a meeting with Weinstein, where she “had to push him off”.

The French actor responded to comments made by her mother about the Hollywood mogul. She told the Telegraph: “I met him for a business meeting in Paris at which he behaved inappropriately and I had to push him off. I got away without it going further, but the experience left me shocked and disgusted.”

She added that she felt she had to speak out in solidarity with other women and said: “I salute the bravery of the women who have come forward … The exploitation of power is ubiquitous. This behaviour is unacceptable and needs to be eliminated.”

On Saturday, some of the film industry’s most powerful figures voted to expel the film producer from their ranks.

Dozens of actors, including Hollywood A-listers Angelina Jolie and Gwyneth Paltrow, have made accusations of sexual abuse against the 65-year-old movie mogul over the past 10 days, prompting the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences to call an emergency meeting.

In a statement, it said the board had “voted well in excess of the required two-thirds majority” to expel Weinstein.

Rose McGowan – one of the first women to accuse Weinstein of sexual harassment and who has since said he raped her – celebrated the Academy’s decision with a post on Instagram.

She wrote: “We slay dragons.”

The actor Mia Farrow, whose son Ronan wrote a New Yorker article in which three women alleged Weinstein had raped them, wrote on Twitter:

Mia Farrow (@MiaFarrow) Proud of the @TheAcademy! Harvey Weinstein is out. There are others- but hopefully we are witnessing the end of an awful era.

The Shameless star Emmy Rossum wrote: “Amen, the academy!!!” while the Hellboy actor Ron Perlman tweeted: “As a member of the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences I am proud of their decision to expel Harvey Weinstein.”

The Hunger Games actor Jeffrey Wright shared the Academy’s statement in full and wrote:

Jeffrey Wright (@jfreewright) Terse, heavy statement right there from the Academy. #Boom pic.twitter.com/z3F5bVeKU5

Woody Allen, who has made several films for Weinstein and has himself faced allegations of sexual assault, has said he feels sad for the producer.

In an interview with the BBC, Allen said: “The whole Harvey Weinstein thing is very sad for everybody involved. Tragic for the poor women that were involved, sad for Harvey that his life is so messed up.

“There’s no winners in that; it’s just very, very sad and tragic for those poor women that had to go through that.”

Allen said he had heard rumours about Weinstein’s behaviour but “no one ever came to me or told me horror stories with any real seriousness”.

Police in the US were also investigating allegations against Weinstein.

The Academy said it was expelling Weinstein “not simply to separate ourselves from someone who does not merit the respect of his colleagues but also to send a message that the era of wilful ignorance and shameful complicity in sexually predatory behaviour and workplace harassment in our industry is over”.

Bafta had already suspended the producer and on Tuesday Weinstein’s wife, the British designer Georgina Chapman, said she was leaving him.

The Writers Guild of America West issued a statement on Saturday saying it “stands in solidarity” with the women who have spoken out, while the Producers Guild of America announced it would be meeting to consider expelling Weinstein.