Harvey Weinstein, center, in court on May 25. Photo: Steven Hirsch/New York Post via AP, Pool

Harvey Weinstein sought leave Monday for an interlocutory appeal to the U.S. Court of Appeals for the Second Circuit over a trial judge's order allowing sex trafficking allegations against the former Hollywood mogul to go forward.

Weinstein pointed to the order from U.S. District Judge Robert Sweet of the Southern District of New York, which acknowledged there was little to no prior authority on the attempt by the plaintiff, Kadian Noble, to extend the federal Trafficking Victims Protection Act to cover her allegations against Weinstein.

The appeal would ask the higher court to address whether the statute can be applied if the commercial component of the statute, which requires an exchange of something of value, is satisfied with something as intangible as a promise of future help in a movie or modeling career.

“Without a true economic component required, every alleged forcible sexual assault in which the victim complies with the assault in order to preserve her safety, for example, would give rise to a claim covered by the Trafficking Statute,” Weinstein said in a court filing. “But that is not what the Trafficking Statute is intended to cover and, if it were, it would not withstand constitutional scrutiny.”

Weinstein's attorney, Kupferstein Manuel name attorney Phyllis Kupferstein, added in a statement, “We respectfully disagree with Judge Sweet's decision and believe that guidance from the Court of Appeals is needed for this novel theory of law.”

Noble filed the trafficking charges against Weinstein in November 2017, shortly after a wave of allegations against the movie mogul became public following an expose in the New Yorker magazine. Noble claimed Weinstein lured her up to his hotel room with promises of reviewing her work and discussions of industry opportunities after the pair ran into each other at the Cannes Film Festival in 2014.

While in his room, Noble claims Weinstein did review a sample of her work, and engaged her in discussion about potential work he could help her get in the future. However, she claims that Weinstein then made sexual advances, predicating future help in the industry on her willingness to do as he wanted, which ultimately included forcibly touching him.

Weinstein filed to dismiss the trafficking charges in the amended complaint, a move he claims amounts to a work-around of the statute of limitations for filing assault charges, which have passed. In his Aug. 14 order, Sweet found that the civil actions allowed under the statute required “broad interpretation” because “broad, expansive language is employed.”

Other courts, he noted, applied the statute to defendants who lured women, under false pretense and with lucrative promise, for sexual purposes. The “entice” qualifier in the statute was the operative word, the judge said, as Noble plausibly alleged Weinstein did just that by allegedly dangling lucrative film and modeling possibilities before her.

In his interlocutory petition, Weinstein argued that absent the critical quid pro quo, the statute simply cannot be applied—and without Noble actually receiving what she was promised, that condition is not met.

“The order holds that the term 'commercial sex act' need not involve any economic component because of the Trafficking Statute's reference to the exchange of 'anything of value,'” Weinstein stated. “But where, as here, there is no trafficking alleged, there must be an economic component to a violation of the Trafficking Statute. To hold otherwise is to interpret the Trafficking Statute out of existence because it would be unconstitutional.”

Herman Law senior attorney Stuart Mermelstein represents Noble. He did not respond to a request for comment.