HE SAID: GUILTY SHE SAID: GUILTY
Cosby bellows & curses after sex assault verdict Long sentence looms as star’s disgrace complete
COSBY JURY CONVICTS ON ALL COUNTS
HESAID:GUILTY SHE SAID: GUILTY HE SAID: GUILTY SHE SAID: GUILTY HE SAID: GUILTY SHE SAID: GUILTY HE SAID: GUILTY SHE SAID: GUILTY HE SAID: GUILTY HE SAID: GUILTY
BILL COSBY’S stunning fall from “America’s Dad” to convicted sex offender reached its dramatic culmination in a Pennsylvania courtroom Thursday — complete with an angry outburst from the disgraced comedian.
It took a jury took just 14 hours to find Cosby guilty of all three felony counts of drugging and sexually assaulting former Temple University staffer Andrea Constand inside his suburban Philadelphia mansion in 2004.
When the sweeping verdict led prosecutors to request Cosby’s $1 million bail be revoked because he might try to flee on a private plane, Cosby lost it.
“He doesn’t have a plane, you a--hole!” Cosby shouted in court, bizarrely referring to himself in the third person.
“That shows what you know!” he bellowed.
The judge ultimately decided Cosby can remain free on his $1 million bail pending a sentencing date that was not immediately set.
Cosby, 80, left the courthouse in Norristown, Pa., without speaking to supporters or the media.
“We don’t think Mr. Cosby is guilty of anything, and the fight is not over,” his lawyer Tom Mesereau said, vowing an appeal.
One Cosby accuser said she wasn't surprised the conviction led Cosby to lose his cool and curse in court.
“He was showing his true colors,” Beth Ferrier, a former model who alleges Coby drugged and assaulted her in the 1980s, told the Daily News.
“He has a terrible temper, always has. That’s what kept us all quiet for so many years. We were scared out of our minds. He knew where we lived, knew our families. That was his power,” she explained.
“He showed his true self when he tore into those five lovely women (who testified). He blamed his victims,” she said. “He’s an angry narcissist.”
Cosby’s crude comments not only revealed his ire but also stood in stark contrast to the fatherly persona he cultivated for himself over the years — one that often included lectures and repeated critiques of others’ harsh language.
He twice turned down the Mark Twain award for humor because he did not approve of the foul commentary and name-calling during the ceremony — though he did eventually accept in 2009.
Thursday’s long-awaited verdict represents the first — and possibly last — criminal conviction for the disgraced comedian, despite dozens of women who have accused him of similar misdeeds.
Cosby was first charged with the three counts of aggravated indecent assault in December 2015, just days before the 12-year statute of limitations on the crime ran out.
He quickly pleaded not guilty, claiming Constand was his willing sex partner.
Constand, 45, gave a much different account during emotional and sometimes grueling testimony spread over two trials almost a year apart.
The former head of women’s basketball operations at Temple said she considered Cosby a mentor and father figure the night he offered her three unidentified blue pills he referred to as “your friends.”
Constand said she thought the
pills were herbal remedies for stress and was stunned and confused when they caused her words to slur and her vision to blur, she testified.
She recalled feeling powerless as Cosby groped her breasts, penetrated her with his fingers and pleasured himself with her hand.
“I wanted it to stop,” Constand said on the witness stand two weeks ago. “I was weak. I was limp, and I could not fight him off.”
The charges against Cosby each carry a maximum sentence of up to 10 years in prison.
Considering the comedian’s advanced age, his conviction could mean he’ll end up spending the rest of his life behind bars.
After the jury of five women and seven men delivered their verdict, Montgomery County District Attorney Kevin Steele commended Constand for her courage.
Wearing a bright white blazer, Constand listened silently as Steele apologized for his predecessor’s decision in 2005 to not pursue a criminal case against the “Cosby Show” star.
“(Cosby) evaded this moment for far too long,” Steele said. “He used his celebrity, he used his wealth, he used his network of supporters to help him conceal his crimes.”
At Cosby’s first trial last June, a jury deadlocked after six days of marathon deliberations.
This time around, the sequestered panel reached its unanimous decision after a 12-day trial that included new testimony from five additional accusers, including former supermodel Janice Dickinson. All of the women shared similar stories of Cosby allegedly drugging and sexually assaulting them without consent.
“Justice has been done!” civil rights lawyer Gloria Allred, who represented three of the five accusers, said on the courthouse steps. “We are so happy that finally we can say women are believed.”
Throughout the trial, Cosby’s lawyers argued Constand was a “con artist” who framed the comedian for money.
They fixated on the $3.38 million settlement she received to end her 2005 lawsuit and claimed she made a series of inconsistent statements.
In the end, the proof was in the pudding pop pitchman’s own words.
The jurors heard that Cosby himself told police in a 2005 interview that he gave Constand a medication without explaining what it was. They also heard that he admitted during a follow-up civil deposition that he obtained seven prescriptions for quaaludes in the 1970s so he could give the now-banned sedative to women he found sexually attractive.
Authorities declined to charge Cosby in 2005, but Constand’s case was revived as more than 50 accusers stepped from the shadows starting in late 2014.
When prosecutors finally filed their criminal complaint, they said a major factor in their decision was Cosby’s own admission that he stockpiled the quaaludes.
In his depositions, Cosby said he kept the powerful drugs on hand to offer them to women, “The same as a person would say, ‘Have a drink.’”
Cosby did not testify in his own defense during either of his trials.
In closing arguments Tuesday, Montgomery County Deputy District Attorney Kristen Feden claimed the “con artist” moniker that Mesereau gave to Constand in his opening statement.
“Yes, you did hear about a con,” Feden said as she pointed to Cosby in the courtroom gallery. “The perpetrator of that con is this man, sitting right here.”
Many view the verdict as a watershed moment brought about by the #MeToo movement.
“This is a notice to sexual predators everywhere,” the National Organization for Women said. “No matter your position in life, our society will not tolerate such violent behavior anymore. Enough is Enough.”
(Cosby) evaded this moment for far too long. He used his celebrity, he used his wealth, he used his network of supporters to help him conceal his crimes. DiSTRiCT ATTORNEy KEviN STEELE