Courtroom drama set to begin
Entertainer’s sexual assault case goes to jury trial today
NORRISTOWN » The next episode in the saga of television sitcom star Bill Cosby will be a drama of the legal kind — his fight against charges he sexually assaulted a woman at his Cheltenham mansion in 2004.
After 18 months of legal wrangling, Cosby, 79, will enter a Montgomery County courtroom on Monday and face the jury of seven men and five women that will ultimately determine his fate during a trial that is expected to last about two weeks.
“What is Monday going to look like?” presiding Judge Steven T. O’Neill pondered Thursday as he indicated he and the lawyers were well-prepared to begin the highprofile trial. “We will do the best we can to start this at 9:30.”
But O’Neill conceded, “It’s like trying to move a large ship at sea.”
After providing jurors, who were selected in Pittsburgh, with initial instructions, the lawyers will deliver their opening state-
ments to the panel, after which prosecutors will begin presenting their evidence. The most dramatic moment will come when alleged victim Andrea Constand enters the courtroom to tell her story and faces Cosby, whose legacy is on the line, for the first time since his arrest.
The trial is expected to garner worldwide media attention.
The trial represents the
first time Cosby, who played Dr. Cliff Huxtable on “The Cosby Show” from 1984 to 1992, has been charged with a crime despite allegations from dozens of women who claimed they were assaulted by the entertainer.
William Henry Cosby Jr., as his name appears on charging documents, faces charges of aggravated indecent assault in connection with his alleged contact with Constand, a former Temple University athletic department employee, after plying her with blue pills and wine at his home sometime between mid-January and mid-February 2004. Constand didn’t report the incident to police until January 2005, about a year after it allegedly occurred.
Cosby, who is not expected to testify at trial, has maintained the contact he had with Constand was consensual. If convicted of the charges, Cosby faces a possible maximum sentence of 15 to 30 years in prison.
The charges were lodged against Cosby on Dec. 30,
2015, before the 12-year statute of limitations to file charges expired.
The legal wrangling that ensued thrust Montgomery County into the national spotlight. Along the way, Cosby lost several key pretrial battles at which he sought to dismiss the charges on grounds he had a 2005 non-prosecution promise from a former district attorney; sought to force Constand to testify at his preliminary hearing; and sought to keep alleged incriminating testimony he gave during a civil deposition out of his trial.
The battle began in January 2016 when lead defense lawyer Brian J. McMonagle unsuccessfully fought to have District Attorney Kevin R. Steele disqualified from the case, contending the newly-elected Steele violated ethical rules by injecting the Cosby case into his fall 2015 campaign ads to advance his political ambitions by inflaming the public against Cosby.
Steele shot back, accusing
Cosby of trying to pick his own prosecutor.
Steele, a Democrat who was then first assistant district attorney, faced former Republican District Attorney Bruce L. Castor Jr., during the fall campaign. In a 30-second television ad, Steele attacked Castor for not charging Cosby in 2005 when Constand first claimed Cosby sexually assaulted her.
Castor claimed there wasn’t enough “reliable and admissible” evidence to prosecute Cosby in 2005.
Steele defeated Castor in the Nov. 3, 2015, election.
In February 2016, Cosby sought a dismissal of the charges, claiming he had a 2005 “binding non-prosecution agreement” with Castor that he would never be prosecuted for sexual assault. Cosby’s lawyers claimed the 2005 agreement was made for the express purpose of inducing Cosby to testify in Constand’s civil litigation against him, removing from him the ability to claim his Fifth Amendment protec-
tion against self-incrimination, thus forcing him to sit for a deposition under oath in the civil case over the course of four days between September 2005 and March 2006.
The civil case was ultimately settled for an undisclosed sum in July 2006, a fact the jury is not permitted to learn about during
the trial.
Prosecutors reopened the investigation against Cosby in July 2015 after Cosby’s deposition connected to the civil suit was unsealed by a judge. In that deposition, Cosby gave damaging testimony, allegedly admitting he obtained quaaludes to give to women with whom he wanted to have sex. Prosecutors contend Cosby also admitted for the first time to developing a romantic interest in Constand when he saw her at a Temple
basketball game and to having sexual contact with Constand.
O’Neill ultimately rejected Cosby’s claim that he had a valid non-prosecution promise from Castor and moved Cosby’s criminal case forward.
Earlier this year, Steele and co-prosecutors M. Stewart Ryan and Kristen Feden asked the judge to allow 13 other women, who accused Cosby of uncharged sexual misconduct dating back to the 1960s, to testify at his
trial. Prosecutors argued the testimony was relevant “to establish a common plan, scheme or design” for the jury.
Steele argued he needed the testimony of the 13 other alleged accusers to prove Constand’s claim that she did not consent to sexual contact with Cosby and to counter inevitable defense attacks on Constand’s credibility at trial.
But McMonagle and codefense lawyer Angela C. Agrusa charged prosecutors
were desperate to salvage a weak sexual assault case against the entertainer by trying to admit “ancient and vague accusations” of 13 other women. Defense lawyers argued that such testimony would be unfairly prejudicial to Cosby.
In the end, O’Neill ruled that only one of the 13 other women can testify at Cosby’s upcoming trial. Prosecutors refer to her as “prior alleged victim six,” a 29-year-old woman who met Cosby around 1990
and who claims Cosby sexually assaulted her during a lunchtime meeting in 1996 at the actor’s bungalow at the Bel Air Hotel in Los Angeles.
Cosby remains free on 10 percent of $1 million bail, pending the outcome of his trial.
The newspaper does not normally identify victims of sex crimes without their consent but is using Constand’s name because she has identified herself publicly.