For Cosby, next battle at sentencing
Comedian might avoid prison during appeal process
The jury in Bill Cosby’s retrial found him guilty of aggravated assault after about 12 hours of deliberation.
His conviction on all three counts on Thursday means they determined beyond a reasonable doubt that the comedian molested Temple University staffer Andrea Constand during a visit to his Philadelphia-area home in 2004, despite the fact that she could not consent because the pills he gave her rendered her unconscious.
But now that the verdict is in, what happens next? Here’s what we know.
Cosby is not going to jail — at least not yet. Judge Steven O’Neill allowed the comedian, who had already posted a $1-million US bond, to remain free on bail until his sentencing, but said he must remain in Pennsylvania until then.
On Friday, however, O’Neill ordered that Cosby must be confined to his suburban home until he is sentenced. Cosby must also wear a GPS monitoring device. A sentencing date has not been announced.
“It’s supposed to happen within 90 days [of conviction] but if all the parties agree it happens after that, it’s fine,” said Brian Zeiger, a defence lawyer who tries cases in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, and the neighbouring Philadelphia and Bucks counties.
Michael Donio, a retired New Jersey superior court judge, said the next legal battle will be at sentencing.
If Cosby is sentenced to prison, he would go directly behind bars. However, Donio expects his lawyers to argue he should be out on bond during the appeal.
Such a request, he said, is usually not granted.
How much time might he serve?
Cosby, who is 80, blind and in declining health, was convicted on three counts, each carrying up to 10 years in prison, so any jail time could be a life sentence.
According to state law, O’Neill could sentence Cosby to either a consecutive prison term (that is, back-to-back terms) or concurrent ones, meaning he would serve them all at the same time, with the longest term determining the duration of his prison stay.
“I would think that it would be a concurrent situation,” said Zeiger, who has tried numerous sex-offence cases. In his experience, whether a defendant gets concurrent sentencing “depends on the judge and the number of victims. In this case, they only proceeded with one. But I think they would also consider his age.”
Fellow Philadelphia-area defence attorney Steven Fairlie said Cosby is likely to get a concurrent sentence because the charges all stem from the same crime. But Fairlie also pointed out that possible victim testimony at the sentencing hearing and Cosby’s outburst following the guilty verdict — Cosby stood up and shouted vulgarities at Montgomery County district attorney Kevin Steele — could lead the judge to consider a harsher sentence of up to 10 years.
“Hurling insults at the district attorney is not going to help his case,” he said.
The length of Cosby’s sentence will determine where he serves time.
Zeiger said that if Cosby’s sentence is less than one or two years, he would likely serve it at the Montgomery County Correctional Facility in Eagleville, Pennsylvania, or through house arrest. He discounts the possibility of work release, citing Cosby’s age.
“If it’s one to two years or more, he would go into the state system in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania,” he said, “and then the trial court would lose jurisdiction over his custody.”
Donio said Cosby’s lawyers would likely argue a prison would be unable to take care of Cosby, who has said he is completely blind. If they could successfully argue this position, and a jail assessment agrees, Cosby might get house arrest or probation.
The defence team is vowing to appeal his conviction. As he left the courthouse Thursday, lead defence attorney Tom Mesereau vowed, “The fight is not over,” indicating his intent to appeal. However, an appeal cannot proceed until Cosby is sentenced.
“After the day of sentencing, you have 10 days to file a motion for reconsideration for certain things, like there wasn’t enough evidence to convict or something is wrong with the sentencing,” Zeiger explains. “The 10-day motion stops the clock on everything. … It’s there intentionally for certain things that allow a trial court to correct simple mistakes.”
Next, he said, the judge would have the power to correct the mistake pointed out in the 10-day motion and remedy it.
“It could be a new trial; it could be new sentencing. If the 10-day motion is denied, the case moves to a higher court and the judge then just has to write an opinion explaining why he ruled a certain way and then the superior court has jurisdiction at that point.”
He added that if the issues the defence plans to raise on appeal don’t fit the parameters of a 10-day motion, they could immediately file a notice of appeal within 30 days of sentencing. “But if you don’t put [the tiny mistakes] in the 10-day motion, you can’t appeal them at a later date.”
The civil cases against him will proceed.
“What’s next?” attorney Lisa Bloom tweeted after the guilty verdict came in. “My defamation case on behalf of Janice Dickinson against Bill Cosby, which we’ve been fighting and winning for three-plus years, goes on.” She added: “Mr. Cosby, I’m looking forward to taking your deposition.”
Dickinson’s California suit asserts that Cosby and lawyer Martin Singer defamed her by calling her a “liar” after she publicly accused Cosby of raping her in 2014, following several other women who had already stepped forward to say they had been assaulted by the entertainer. Cosby is appealing a ruling allowing Dickinson’s case to proceed.
Three other civil cases wait in the wings, each having been put on hold until Cosby’s criminal case is resolved. All of those other allegations were too old to pursue in criminal court under statutes of limitation. Consequently, some of Cosby’s accusers have filed lawsuits in civil courts seeking to go after Cosby. Here’s an update on the other cases: Judy Huth
In Los Angeles, Cosby is being sued by Judy Huth, who is repped by Bloom’s mother, power lawyer Gloria Allred, who represents a number of other Cosby accusers, including three who were allowed to testify at the retrial.
In her suit, Huth accuses the comedian of sexual battery: She says he forced her to perform a sex act on him in a bedroom of the Playboy Mansion around 1974, when she was 15. In June 2017, Los Angeles Superior Court Judge Craig Karlan tentatively scheduled a trial on Huth’s lawsuit for July 30, 2018.
In December, Cosby gave a deposition in the case, which was then sealed by a judge who ruled Cosby can be deposed again once the criminal case is concluded. Chloe Goins
Former model Chloe Goins is suing the comedian for sexual battery and other claims, also in California. Goins says Cosby drugged and sexually abused her at the Playboy Mansion in 2008.
Prosecutors declined to file a criminal case against Cosby stemming from Goins’ allegations, saying investigators could not corroborate them. Last summer, a judge denied Cosby’s motion to dismiss and scheduled a trial for June 2018. Florida lawyer Spencer Kuvin represents Goins. The Massachusetts defamation case
Seven women sued Cosby for defamation in one lawsuit pending in Massachusetts, where Cosby has a home in Shelburne Falls. They say he sexually abused them decades ago and then defamed them after they went public by having his agents deny the claims and brand them liars.
Repped by lawyer Joseph Cammarata, the suit started with one accuser, Tamara Green, and grew to include six other women: Therese Serignese, Linda Traitz, Louisa Moritz, Barbara Bowman, Joan Tarshis and Angela Leslie.
But Judge Mark Mastroianni granted Cosby’s motion to dismiss five of the counts relating to accuser Angela Leslie because the plaintiffs conceded the allegedly defamatory statements at issue were not about her. Cosby tweeted about the development on June 30, calling it another example of his success in getting claims against him dismissed.