According to a number of texts, revealed by TMZ, along with an image of actors Asia Argento and Jimmy Bennett lying topless in bed allegedly after having intercourse, a woman identified as Asia Argento admitted to her one of her friends that she had had sex with the then 17 year old, despite previous claims that she had never slept with him.
TMZ claimed that the Italian actress, in the messages made public, noted: “I had sex with him it felt weird. I didn't know he was a minor until the shakedown letter,” thereby referring to a recent article by The New York Times, in which it exposed a payment allegedly made to silence Jimmy Bennett.
And I never bought Asia Argento's claim that she and Bourdain had an "open relationship" to explain those photos of her with another man just says before Bourdain killed himself.
— 'Sources Say' is Greek for 'Fake News' (@NolteNC) 22 августа 2018 г.
People have open relationships but DISCRETION is key so neither party is embarrassed or emasculated.
“The public knows nothing. Only what the NYT wrote. Which is one sided. The shakedown letter. The horny kid jumped me,” Argento, who pioneered the #MeToo movement, was cited as saying.
According to The New York Times, Argento, who was 37 at the time of the alleged encounter in a California hotel room, paid Bennett $380,000 from an account of her ex-boyfriend Anthony Bourdain, who committed suicide earlier this summer, to silence Bennett just months after she had accused director Harvey Weinstein for multiple counts of sexual misconduct. Argento herself has flatly denied those claims, putting the blame on Bourdain.
More and more it appears Asia Argento was the virus that Anthony Bourdain could not shake. He paid her accuser $380K to protect her and spare her shame (and I tend to believe the allegations) and still, she’s throwing him under the bus now after his death. Victim? I think not.
— 𝓚𝓪𝓽 ⚖️ (@TheKathyBray) 21 августа 2018 г.
Asia Argento should not be using Anthony Bourdain to justify her actions. If you deny the allegations, do it on your own behalf. One can be both a victim and a perpetrator; but dissolving herself of any responsibility adds to her lack of credibility. #MeToo #AsiaArgento
— Caitlin Barlow (@Catalina1016) 21 августа 2018 г.
In April, Bennett, now 22, had threatened legal action with regard to the case, with Argento publicly claiming on Tuesday that she had “never had any sexual relationship” with her co-actor, who played her son in “The Heart is Deceitful Above All Things” in 2004.
Subsequent messages leaked by TMZ, also purportedly penned by Argento, suggest that when she herself was 17, she had been “with a 33-year-old for years.”
“If I lose my job I will move to Africa or the Amazon forest. I want to be among the 90 per cent of the world that doesn't give a f*** about this s***,” the supposed Hollywood star was cited as saying.
Argento then supposedly sent an image of a love confession allegedly left for her by Bennett on a sheet of paper with a Ritz Carlton logo on it. “Asia, I love you with all my heart. So glad we met again and I'm so glad your [sic] in my life. Jimmy,” the note read.
“He wrote me this afterwards and kept sending me unsolicited nudes all these years up until two weeks before the attorneys [sic] letter,” Argento supposedly claimed, adding that he “told her she had been his sexual fantasy since he was 12.”
The latest report as well as subsequent speculations appear to have hit a nerve with many Twitter users, with one arrist even coming up with posters "all over Los Angeles", featuring the word "SheToo" and a revealing gesture.
Women are hypocrites. Women are abusers. Women are liars. Just like men. This obvious fact — that women are fully human — bears repeating in light of the Asia Argento news and should inform the #MeToo movement going forward. My latest: https://t.co/ZTMYUpW6bA
— Bari Weiss (@bariweiss) 21 августа 2018 г.
Yet another pathetic attempt to deflect from real issues here. No, nobody expects Asia Argento to be a ‘perfect victim’, she’s just not supposed to sexually assault a minor pic.twitter.com/iHCQXR1hx0
— Doktor Caligari (@DrMCaligari) 22 августа 2018 г.
Bennett’s accusation comes nearly a year after his “sexual abuser” claimed she had been sexually assaulted by Harvey Weinstein in a hotel room in 1997 when she was 21 years old. Being among the first to give rise to the #MeToo movement, she told Ronan Farrow of The New Yorker last year that the already popular director had asked her for a massage and then performed oral sex on her against her will.
READ MORE: Bill Clinton Defends Himself Over Lewinsky Scandal, Calls #MeToo 'Way Overdue'
