A New York judge has ruled that the sexual assault case against disgraced movie mogul Harvey Weinstein can move forward to trial.

After a brief conversation with lawyers on both sides, Judge James Burke declined to dismiss any of the remaining charges against Weinstein, who is accused of raping or sexually assaulting two women years ago. Weinstein has consistently denied all allegations of non-consensual sex.

Weinstein’s next court date is scheduled for March 7. Burke also ruled that Weinstein’s claims of prosecutorial misconduct had “no basis.” He also denied Weinstein’s request for an evidentiary hearing.

Burke's ruling was a welcome win for the prosecution, whose case had been weakened by the October dismissal of a third woman's case and defense attorney Benjamin Brafman's campaign to raise doubts about police conduct during the investigation.

The prosecutors maintained that their case is strong and there is ample evidence to warrant a trial.

His client remained silent as he left the courthouse but Brafman told reporters, “We intend to vigorously defend this case to the best of our ability. It does not in any way suggest that the case against Mr. Weinstein is going to end badly.”

In a later statement to USA TODAY, he acknowledged, "We are obviously disappointed, by the Court's decision to deny our motion to dismiss the Indictment. Judge Burke has however ruled and we must accept his ruling.

"Nothing in the Court's ruling, however, removes the flawed theory of this case that we intend to vigorously defend at trial, where we are confident that Mr. Weinstein will be completely exonerated."

After Burke ruled, Time's Up president Lisa Borders declared, “Today, here in New York, we saw the first steps towards justice.”

In his remarks on the courthouse steps, Brafman urged the media and public not to conflate the Weinstein criminal case with #MeToo.

"This is not about the #MeToo movement. This is defending a specific criminal case," he said. "If the #MeToo movement helps level the playing field for women throughout the world, then we strongly (support) that movement. A movement, however, should not be permitted to push an indictment that is deeply flawed as we believe this movement has done in this case."

Attorney Gloria Allred, who represents some of Weinstein's accusers, took issue with Brafman's characterization, stating, "This indictment was based on evidence and testimony before the grand jury. It was not based on the #MeToo movement. So let's be clear about that."

The Weinstein case so far has underscored what lawyers and activists already know: It's difficult to prosecute sexual assaults many years after the fact. It's far easier to shame a prominent man into ruin than to muster the admissible evidence to persuade a jury to convict him of a sex crime. And even men accused of sex crimes have due process rights in an American criminal court.

In May, Weinstein was arrested, indicted twice and charged with raping a woman he knew in a hotel room in March 2013 and forcibly performing oral sex on another woman in 2006 at his Manhattan apartment. He denies all allegations of non-consensual sex. He pleaded not guilty, was released on $1 million bail and restricted to his homes in New York and in Connecticut.

Since then, Brafman has accused Manhattan prosecutors and police detectives of "irreparably" tainting the grand jury proceeding by failing to disclose exculpatory information to the defense and hiding evidence that contradicted what the three accusers said Weinstein did to them.

Weinstein was one of Hollywood's most feared and admired power brokers until last October when explosive exposés in The New York Times and The New Yorker documented a history of alleged rape, sexual harassment, sexual assault and general gross sexual misconduct against scores of women, some of them A-list stars, going back decades and crossing multiple jurisdictions from London to New York to Los Angeles.

Those stories helped pump up what came to be known as the culture-changing #MeToo movement which saw scores of men in multiple industries – but especially Hollywood and the media – brought down and shamed by accusations of sexual misconduct.

After more than a year of near-daily allegations and law enforcement investigations, it has turned out that most of the accusations are too old to prosecute in criminal court, although many lawsuits in civil court have been filed, especially against Weinstein.

As the shocking allegations against him mounted, Weinstein lost his power and millions, his career and company, his wife and family, and most of all his reputation as an edgy entertainment genius – and all in a matter of weeks.

But so far, he is the only #MeToo-era accused man charged with a sex crime in a criminal court anywhere. That puts him at the top of the #MeToo Most Wanted list, the man activists most want to see convicted of a sex crime and imprisoned for the rest of his life as a sexual predator.

No matter what happens in the Manhattan criminal trial, Weinstein's legal woes are not going away. He is still under criminal investigation in Los Angeles, Beverly Hills and London.

Also, he is facing nearly three-dozen civil plaintiffs, including anonymous "Jane Does" and Ashley Judd, one of his first A-list accusers. Plus, he is fighting lawsuits filed against his former company in bankruptcy court.

Some of the civil suits against him are class action suits, some have been filed by individual anonymous women. They accuse him of rape, sexual harassment, sexual assault, battery, sex trafficking, infliction of emotional distress and defamation, fraudulent business acts and racketeering.

Contributing: Associated Press