By Maria Vultaggio
Managing Editor, Culture & Trends
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In a new twist, disgraced #MeToo activist Asia Argento claimed Jimmy Bennett was the one who assaulted her when he was 17 years old in a California hotel room. The legal age of consent in the state is 18. Argento was 37 years old at the time.
Now, Argento said Bennett is fortunate she didn't press charges against him. "Asia chose at the time not to prosecute Bennett for sexually attacking her," her lawyer, Mark Jay Heller, told TMZ Wednesday.
Heller argued the leaked text messages between Argento and a friend proved that she was allegedly assaulted. Argento was "frozen" when the incident happened, she wrote in one of the texts. "The horny kid jumped me," she wrote. "I had sex with him it felt weird."
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Argento denied having a relationship with Bennett when his claim against her came out last month in a bombshell New York Times report, but Heller said that the Italian actress was telling the truth: It happened once and there wasn't a relationship.
Argento famously dated renowned celebrity chef Anthony Bourdain. When Bennett discovered their relationship, he "chose to intrude on that relationship and demand financial payment from Bourdain in consideration for not embarrassing Asia and indirectly Bourdain," Heller claimed. The chef, who died in June, reportedly agreed to pay Bennett $380,000 to protect Argento, even though she was innocent, Heller claimed.
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Bourdain reportedly paid Bennett $250,000 in April, but Argento wouldn't give the rest.
"Asia does not intend to prosecute Bennett for his conduct and recognizes that his unfortunate past, his stalled acting career and a lawsuit against his own parents for allegedly misappropriating more than a million and a half dollars from his account might explain his desperation to seek money from Asia and Bourdain for this falsely alleged incident that took place more than five years ago," Heller said.
Heller said Argento's accusations do not affect the star's credibility as a Harvey Weinstein sexual assault accuser. "Asia's courage to originally make the accusations against Harvey Weinstein has not waned," Heller told the New York Post. "Phase Two of the #MeToo movement dictates that the voice of a victim, even one with a history that may be in question, should be heard and she is hopeful that in the Court of Public Opinion it will ultimately be determined that Asia never initiated an inappropriate sexual contact with a minor, but rather she was attacked by Bennett and might even be suffering the fallback of a smear campaign by those already accused who may have a vested interest in their accusers being denied credibility."
Argento returned to Twitter for the first time in weeks to slam androgynous model Rain Dove, who leaked their texts to police and the media. "Very funny coming from a sick pathological liar like you, who made money out of me by selling selected text messages in order to portray me for something I am not," she wrote.
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