{"id":107049,"date":"2022-10-25T00:36:04","date_gmt":"2022-10-25T00:36:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/i-kept-saying-no-update-deadline\/"},"modified":"2022-10-25T00:36:04","modified_gmt":"2022-10-25T00:36:04","slug":"i-kept-saying-no-update-deadline","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/harchi90.com\/i-kept-saying-no-update-deadline\/","title":{"rendered":"\u201cI Kept Saying No\u201d \u2013 Update \u2013 Deadline"},"content":{"rendered":"
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\n\tUPDATED with afternoon session:<\/strong> In texts from Haleigh Breest to a friend the day after she says she was raped by filmmaker Paul Haggis in 2013, Breest called the sex \u201crough and aggressive,\u201d wrote \u201cnever ever again\u201d and \u201cHe tore me.\u201d She described \u201cTrying to forget last night,\u201d which she had spent at Haggis’ apartment in Soho after a movie-screening party. <\/p>\n

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\t\u201cAnd I keep saying no,\u201d Breest wrote to the friend in the string of texts, which were shown to jurors Monday on the fourth day of Haggis’ sexual assault civil trial in Manhattan. \u201cBut I guess that’s just an invitation or a challenge.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\tBreest also wrote, \u201cBut he’s like the most charming person to have a conversation with and so smart!!!\u201d She texted, \u201cI don’t think he’s a terrible person and if you got to know him you’d like him but what he did was so wrong!\u201d<\/p>\n

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\tBreest was a 26-year-old movie events publicist at a company in New York City owned by a friend of Haggis. She went to his apartment after the party, where she had been working, and said that once there, Haggis forced her to have unprotected oral and vaginal sex, and pushed his fingers inside of her. She tested that she passed out on a guest bed and left the apartment in the morning to go home and then back to work.<\/p>\n

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\tBreest tested that she called the friend twice that day and that she can’t remember her words, but in both conversations described what happened as a violent, unwanted assault. The first person to use the word \u201crape\u201d in the texts shown to jurors was her friend. \u201cI would call this borderline rape\u201d the friend wrote. <\/p>\n

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\t\u201cIt sort of is Live and learn!\u201d Breest texted.<\/p>\n

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\tA lawyer for Haggis, Priya Chaudhry, questioned Breest for three hours about the alleged rape, and about the tone and content of texts and emails between her and a handful of people including Haggis himself \u2014 who she saw 11 days later at another movie event she was working. Breest emailed Haggis afterward, writing, \u201cIt was so crowded last night! Did you have fun?\u201d and inquiring, \u201cWhat time zone are you on? :)\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\u201cYou end that email with a smiley face, correct?\u201d Chaudhry asked.<\/p>\n

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\t\u201cCorrect,\u201d Breest said.<\/p>\n

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\tChaudhry also asked, \u201cAnd you sought out an interaction with someone who you claim sexually assaulted you?\u201d <\/p>\n

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\tBreest often tried to elaborate beyond a yes or a no but found some of her longer explanatory replies stricken by the judge, Sabrina Kraus. <\/p>\n

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\tOn Friday, Breest grew agitated about five hours into a cross-examination by Chaudhry that Breest lawyer Zoe Salzman characterized afterward in a statement as the defense going \u201cso far as to demand Ms. Breest stand up and reenact the rape.\u201d Deadline has requested a response from Haggis’ lawyers.<\/p>\n

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\tBreest on Friday was standing next to the witness box and trying to show how Chaudhry how she squirmed to avoid Haggis. On Monday, the judge announced an end to any testimony that cannot be verbalized for the written record of the trial.<\/p>\n

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\t\u201cEven the most inept words are better than a motion that couldn’t be observed for the record,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

\n\tPREVIOUSLY, 11:40 AM:<\/strong> A Canadian woman testing in the sexual assault civil trial of filmmaker Paul Haggis said Monday that when she rejected Haggis’ sexual advances at a television industry festival in Canada in 2006, he pinned her against a wall in his hotel room, and later groped and shoved her as she prepared to leave the hotel in a taxi.<\/p>\n

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\tThe woman, who Deadline is not identifying by name, is one of four lawyers for Haleigh Breest plan to call to the stand with similar sexual of rape or attempted assault. Breest, who has accused Haggis of raping her in 2013 when she was an events publicist, returned to the stand on Monday afternoon to resume a lengthy cross-examination that left her in tears Friday and brought the day’s testimony to an early close. The judge, Sabrina Kraus, allowed the other accuser to go first, out of turn, citing scheduling issues.<\/p>\n

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\tIn more than two hours on the stand, Jane Doe said she attended the Banff World Television Festival in June 2006 on a prize fellowship in order to make industry contacts and pitch documentary projects; she has since left the field. Haggis, who came up through television, was the keynote speaker and main honoree at a festival in Banff, Alberta, for his Oscar-winning work on Crash<\/em> and Million Dollar Baby.<\/em><\/p>\n

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\t\u201cHe had won two Oscars recently and that was big deal for a Canadian filmmaker,\u201d the woman tested today.<\/p>\n

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\tShe said she first saw Haggis speak at a Q&A, and then sought him out at a pub where attendees got to visit one-on-one with the festival’s guest of honor. She said the two exchanged jokes, pleasantries and talked shop, and then Haggis invited her to an exclusive after-party at the festival’s hotel headquarters. \u201cIt sounded like a great opportunity,\u201d she said.<\/p>\n

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\tAs soon as they climbed into a cab together, she realized how it might have looked to other attendees at the pub, she told a Breest lawyer, Zoe Salzman. <\/p>\n

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\t\u201dI said I hope nobody got the wrong impression,\u201d she tested. \u201cHe said, ‘People usually do.’ \u201d <\/p>\n

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\tOn the cab ride back to the hotel, Haggis appeared to be talking and texting on his mobile phone to confirm the location of the after-party, she tested. Back at the hotel they walked down a long hallway to a room \u201cand he took out his key to open it,\u201d she said. \u201cI was immediately apprehensive,\u201d she said. She said she took a step backwards at the doorway and Haggis told her, \u201cDo n’t worry,\u201d because the after-party was going to be in his room and more people were en route.<\/p>\n

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\tInside, he poured them wine and held out the glass for her to step forward and claim it, and when she did, he kissed her, the woman testified. \u201cI was totally caught off guard,\u201d she said. she apologized. \u201cI said I’m so sorry if I gave you mixed signals. I’m here for professional reasons,\u201d she tested. <\/p>\n

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\tHaggis apologized and suggested they just sit on the couch instead and talk about her career, she said. But after 20 minutes or so he tried to kiss her again and when she got up and backed away, she said, she eventually backed into a wall with him advancing on her. He grabbed her arms and tried to kiss her once more, she tested. When she turned away to avoid the kiss, she said, \u201cMr. Haggis used his left hand to grab my face.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\t\u201cCut it out. You’re making me feel like an asshole,\u201d she said he told her. With one arm unpinned, she wriggled free and left the hotel room, and Haggis trailed her out, offering to pay for her cab back to the YMCA where she and the other fellowship winners were being put up for the festival. She said she agreed to the fare, and when the cab arrived, he grabbed her breasts from behind and kissed her neck, and then shoved her forcefully toward the cab \u2014 hard enough that she stumbled. She said he handed the driver money.<\/p>\n

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\t\u201cI felt humiliated. I felt gross. I felt stupid. I just wanted to get out of there,\u201d the woman tested. Asked by Salzman why she felt stupid, she replied, \u201cBecause I stupidly believed people were coming\u201d to the after-party at his hotel room even though \u201ca lot of time had elapsed.\u201d<\/p>\n

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\tOn cross examination by a Haggis lawyer, Priya Chaudhry, the witness said she never pitched Haggis on any of her project ideas in any of the time she spoke with him.<\/p>\n<\/p><\/div>\n