The women who have accused Harvey Weinstein of sexual abuse spoke of the same tactic: the movie producer would make young women feel safe with the presence of his female assistants, who would later disappear, leaving the mogul alone to harass and assault his guests, they alleged.

After a week of reading stories casting blame on Weinstein’s female employees, one former assistant said she wanted to speak up and make clear that the situation was much more complicated. She and other women at his company were also victims of Weinstein’s abuse – regularly exploited and manipulated, leaving some severely traumatized, the woman alleged in a recent interview with the Guardian.

“We weren’t safe either,” said the woman, who worked closely with Weinstein as an assistant in London in the last five years and requested anonymity. “It was an abusive relationship on every level.”

The woman, who was in her early 30s when she was employed at the Weinstein Company, echoed the complaints of others who have worked for the disgraced producer, alleging that his staff was forced to do demeaning and humiliating tasks to facilitate and cover up his philandering. Many, including her, she claimed, didn’t suspect they were enabling sexual assault or rape.

“He had manipulated everyone in his path with that one purpose, and that was for sex,” she said. “It’s awful. I should have walked out. I should have said something.”

Weinstein has been fired from his company and widely denounced by Hollywood following a slew of accusations that he sexually harassed and assaulted young women, allegedly inviting models and actors to hotel rooms for business purposes before demanding massages and sex. The scandal has launched criminal investigations and has inspired women across the industry to speak up about misconduct by powerful men.

The New Yorker investigation, which uncovered rape allegations, claimed that women at the company served as a “honeypot”, helping lure his victims.

The former UK assistant said she was heartbroken to read about the assault claims, and that while some close associates may have known what was happening, she claimed that women like her were not willing collaborators and had also suffered through verbal abuse, vicious threats and intimidation.

“We were in danger, too,” she said, adding that she had joined the company with aspirations of advancing in the film industry. “You think you’re going to get this illustrious career. You really want to believe you are going to succeed. He preys on this. He preys on young, vulnerable people he can manipulate.”

Weinstein has “unequivocally denied” allegations of non-consensual sex and has said he denies many of the claims of sexual harassment first reported in the New York Times. His spokesperson did not respond to questions about the assistant’s claims, but sent an earlier statement that said: “Mr Weinstein is hoping that, if he makes enough progress, he will be given a second chance.”

Although she was hired as a business assistant, in a role focused on development and acquisitions, the woman said she was forced to do a lot of personal assistant work, sometimes centered around Weinstein’s sexual escapades.

“Sex was a daily part of my life working for him. It was about enabling him in so many ways. It’s really disgusting,” she said, recounting how she would be tasked with keeping women Weinstein had slept with away from his wife at events.

When Weinstein wanted to be left alone with a woman, “he would tell me to fuck off”, she further alleged. “I was scared of him.”

At the time, the encounters made her very uncomfortable, given that the young women were hoping for career opportunities.

“That’s still an abuse of power,” she said. “They thought they were getting something out of it.”

It was more clear to her now, she added, that he had exploited women who worked for him while making advances against other women: “He used us to make him look less predatory.”

She recalled one incident in which she learned that a young woman allegedly confided to Weinstein’s driver that she had had a bad experience with the producer in a hotel room – the first time the assistant suspected that his behavior could be more abusive or violent than she had thought.

“I felt sick,” she said.

The culture of the office made it impossible to speak up and it was hard to find a way out, she added. “You’re trapped. You’re tired. You’re vulnerable. He starts breaking you down,” she recalled. “It just spirals out of control the minute you start to realize what’s going on. You start to feel like you’re going insane.”

While some in the industry began warning each other about Weinstein over the years, working to shield vulnerable women from the producer, his own staff had no recourse, she said: “We were totally forgotten.”

Other former assistants and employees have also spoken up about being treated like “dirt” and Weinstein behaving like a “monster”, with one describing to the Guardian a culture of “fear” and “silence”.

The former assistant said it was a huge relief to see the reporting on Weinstein and that she hoped it would help validate the pain women across the world have endured: “This might change history for women, not just in the film industry, but for women in the workplace.”

If you have stories to share about Weinstein or sexual misconduct in Hollywood, contact sam.levin@theguardian.com