Judge orders GPS monitoring for house-bound Cosby

NEW YORK: Convicted sex offender Bill Cosby was ordered to be fitted with a GPS monitor and undergo a violent sexual predators’ assessment, allowed to leave home only for medical treatment or to meet his lawyers.

Judge Steven O’Neill signed the order, clarifying the terms of the disgraced icon’s US$ 1mil (RM3.9mil) bail, one day after a Pennsylvania jury found Cosby guilty on three counts of sexual assault.

The frail, 80yearold Cosby – once beloved as “America’s Dad” and the main star of The Cosby Show, the top television show during the 80s – faces a sentence of up to 30 years for drugging and molesting Andrea Constand at his Philadelphia mansion in January 2004.

Prosecutors on Thursday demanded his bail be revoked, arguing he was a flight risk – but an irritated O’Neill refused to “simply lock him up right now”.

The judge confined Cosby to his palatial residence in Cheltenham, the same home where the actor assaulted Constand 14 years ago, and instructed probation officers to fit him with a GPS monitor.

Cosby can travel only within the greater Philadelphia area, and solely for medical treatment or to meet his legal team upon written request, O’Neill said.

The disgraced megastar’s passport has already been impounded.

He must also submit to an assessment by a sexual offenders board to determine how much of a danger he poses, before being sentenced by O’Neill in 75 days’ time.

His conviction ends the career of once towering figure in late 20th century American popular culture, the first black actor to grace primetime US television, hitting the big time after growing up as the son of a maid.

Cosby’s lawyers have vowed to appeal.