WOMEN SHAMING A CELEBRITY MONSTER
It’s an image of defiance: 35 women unite to tell their horrific stories of abuse by comedy legend Bill Cosby
1. Sunni Welles, former actress
She was a 17-year-old aspiring singer when she met Cosby in the mid-1960s. he invited Sunni to a hollywood jazz club. She says she recalls him slipping something into her soft drink before waking up naked in bed with him in a sparsely furnished flat. ‘When I got home I showered and felt as if I had had sex,’ she recalls. It happened again after a second trip to the club. ‘I remember drinking a Coke and again I awakened in the same room alone and naked . . .I didn’t hear from Bill Cosby again.’
2. Carla Ferrigno, ex Playboy bunny
NOW married to The Incredible hulk star Lou Ferrigno, Carla went on a ‘double date’ with her then boyfriend and Cosby and his wife in 1967. They all ended up at Cosby’s house, where the star tried to force himself on her. ‘(It) took all my body strength to stop him.’
3. Joan Tarshis, journalist
The 19-year- old met her idol in 1969 through friends. Cosby, who pretended he was interested in her comedy writing talents, drugged and raped her, she says. on one occasion he gave her a Bloody Mary that hit her like a ‘sledgehammer’ and she later collapsed in his limo: ‘I didn’t realise that I had been raped . . . I just knew something horrible had happened.’
4. Linda Brown, former model
The Canadian was 21 when, she says, Cosby drugged and assaulted her in 1969 after her agency set them up on a dinner date in Toronto. he offered to drive her home but stopped off at his hotel room to collect a present, giving her a soft drink after which she blacked out. ‘I felt like a real-life blow-up doll for him.’
5. Cindra Ladd, entertainment exec
The then 19-year- old became friends with Cosby in 1969 while working for a film producer in New York. one night he invited her to meet him at a friend’s flat before a trip to the cinema. She complained of a headache and he gave her a capsule pill. ‘What I do recall . . .is waking up the next morning nude in the bed of the friend’s apartment and seeing Cosby,’ she says. ‘It was obvious to me that he had had sex with me.’
6. Victoria Valentino, former actress
The ex-Playboy bunny says she was raped by Cosby in 1969 after he took her out for dinner to ‘cheer her up’ following her six-year-old son’s death. ‘he reached over and put a pill next to my wine glass,’ she recalls. ‘he said, “Take this, it will make you feel better.”’
7. Linda Joy Traitz, former saleswoman
She was 18 when she encountered Cosby, who offered her a lift home from the California restaurant where she was working. Instead she says he took her to a beach where he tried to make her take a pill before becoming sexually aggressive.
8. Tamara Green, lawyer
AS A 20-year-old cosmetics model she met Cosby through mutual friends in hollywood. one day, she was feeling ill but Cosby persuaded her to join him for lunch. After he gave her two red and grey pills, she collapsed and Cosby drove her home where he undressed her. She struggled so hard that he only managed to sexually assault rather than rape her, she says.
9. Autumn Burns, casino employee
She says she was a 20-year- old model working at the Sahara casino in Las Vegas when she met Cosby in 1970. one night, he gave her $500 to gamble and invited her to his suite where he made her a whisky. ‘I felt woozy,’ she says, and claims he sexually assaulted her.
10. Kathy McKee, former actress
The one-time Las Vegas showgirl and girlfriend of Sammy Davis Jnr says that Cosby — once a friend — ambushed her in the early 1970s when she walked into his hotel room in Michigan to give him some food he had ordered. ‘he spun me around, pulled my panties down and just took it,’ she says.
11. Louisa Moritz, actress
LOUISA — who would star in one Flew over The Cuckoo’s Nest — was 24 when she says Cosby assaulted her in her dressing room before they appeared as guests on The Tonight Show in 1971. When she resisted, he left. ‘As he was leaving, he said, “I hope you’re not going to upset me because then I’m not going to help you,” ’ she says.
12. Helen Hayes, former legal secretary
IN 1973, she and two friends were at a celebrity tennis tournament in California where, she says, they met the ‘predatory’ Cosby. That evening, the friends went out to dinner but he caught up with them and grabbed hayes’ breast.
13. Margie Shapiro, former locksmith
She was 19 and working in a donut shop in Santa Monica, California, when she met Cosby in 1975. he took her to hugh hefner’s Playboy mansion where he forced to take a pill as a forfeit for losing a game of pool. She claims she awoke to find Cosby in the act of sex.
14. Marcella Tate, former model
She met Cosby in Chicago in 1975 when she was an aspiring model and asked her to take him to the Playboy Mansion, where he gave her a drink that left her feeling drugged and convinced she had been raped. ‘In 1975, it wasn’t an issue that was even discussed,’ she says.
15. Therese Serignese, nurse from Florida
She says she was raped by Cosby in 1976 when she was 19, after the star had spotted her in a Las Vegas gift shop and invited her to his stage show. Afterwards, they met backstage where he asked her to swallow two pills.
16. Sarita Butterfield, ex Playboy bunny
AFTER she appeared as a 22-yearold in a 1977 issue of Playboy, Cosby tracked her down and invited her to spend Christmas eve with his family in Massachusetts. There, Ms Butterfield says Cosby cornered her in his guesthouse, groping her breasts and trying to kiss her.
17. Patricia Leary Steuer
The former training and development specialist was 22 and working at the university of Massachusetts when Cosby came in 1978 to give a lecture. offering to help her budding singing career, he invited her to dinner at his home where he gave her a drink and she began to feel woozy. ‘I really had no idea what his modus operandi was,’ she says.
18. PJ Masten, company boss
She was a Playboy bunny when, she says, Cosby attacked her at the Playboy Club in Chicago in 1979. She was lured to his hotel room on the promise of dinner and Cosby, who was with male friends, gave her a glass of Grand Marnier. ‘I woke up feeling very groggy and very sore. I knew I had been raped,’ she says.
19. Joyce Emmons, comedy club boss
COSBY drugged her in his hotel suite after a night out with friends in 1979, she claims. After asking him to give her a pill for her headache, she remembers waking up naked in bed with a male friend of Cosby beside her. She says Cosby l ater admitted he gave her a Quaalude, a powerful tranquiliser used as a recreational drug.
20. Linda Kirkpatrick, entrepreneur
She played against Cosby in a Las Vegas tennis tournament in 1981 when she was 25. Invited to come to his show, she was escorted to his dressing room where he gave her a drink. The rest of the night was a blur, but she remembers him on top of her trying to kiss her. he apologised for his behaviour the next day, only to try to force himself on her again.
21. Janice Dickinson, TV personality
FAMOUS as the first ‘supermodel’, she was 28 when Cosby invited her to the California resort of Lake Tahoe, promising an acting opportunity. They dined and he gave her a pill with her wine. The following morning it was clear she had been raped. ‘I have been brutally and catastrophically, traumatically altered for ever,’ she says.
22. Janice BakerKinney, TV executive
She was working as a 24-year-old casino bartender in reno, Nevada, when she and a friend were invited to a party at Cosby’s. They arrived to find only Cosby, who gave Janice two pills. She came round to find her clothes loosened and Cosby carrying her up the stairs.
23. Heidi Thomas, music teacher
She was an aspiring actress in 1984, when her agent set up a meeting in Las Vegas with Cosby who was ‘interested in mentoring young talent’. The star poured her a glass of Chablis to help her relax. ‘I really don’t remember much, except waking up in his bedroom,’ she says. She remembers him telling her: ‘I’m your friend.’
He gave me a pill. Next thing I knew I was naked in his bed
24. Beth Ferrier, ex flight attendant
she and Cosby had an affair of several months before they split up. A few weeks later, the star asked Beth to a show in Denver where he gave her a ‘favourite’ cappuccino. she woke up hours later in the back of her car. ‘It is important for the world to know the truth about how Bill Cosby hunted me like a predator’, she says.
25. Beverly Johnson, model and actress
In the mid-1980s her agent said Cosby wanted to audition her at his home for a small part on the Cosby show. the star gave her a cup of espresso and Beverly says she knew she’d been drugged after two sips. her put his arm on her waist but she fought him off, cursing him so he put her in a cab.
26. Barbara Bowman, artist
she was a pretty blonde 17-yearold aspiring actress whom Cosby offered to mentor in the mid-1980s. ‘I was drugged half the time when I was with him,’ she says. ‘I would come out of a delusional experience going, “Whoa, what was that?’. he would say, “Well, I needed to undress you and wash your clothes because you got drunk and made a fool of yourself.” ’
27. Chelan Lasha, dietician
she was a 17-year- old schoolgirl when she met Cosby in 1986 in Las Vegas, after her family had asked him for help with her modelling career. In his hotel suite, he gave her coffee and a pill – supposedly for her cold. As she became woozy, he led her to his bed. she woke 13 hours later with Cosby standing over her, shouting: ‘Daddy says wake up.’
28. Rebecca Lynn Neal
the massage therapist was working at a Las Vegas health club where Cosby played tennis when the star invited her out. In 1986, several years later, she finally admitted to her sister that Cosby had drugged and sexually assaulted her on their date. ‘he told me to calm down, he wasn’t going to hurt me,’ she recalls.
29. Sammie Mayes, writer
she met Cosby in 1987 at a new Orleans TV convention where she was working as a journalist. Cosby agreed to an interview and took her back to his hotel room. After he mixed her a drink, she took two slurps and passed out. ‘Bill Cosby, that one time, played a major factor in the direction my life took, toward the dark side,’ she says.
30. Helen Gumpel, law official
As A model and actress, she s ays Cosby made sexual advances towards her when she appeared in a 1987 episode of the Cosby show. summoned to his dressing room, she claims he had her sit on a couch, where he handed her a drink, and then stood with his crotch in her face.
31. Kaya Thompson, former writer
she was a 17-year-old hoping to model in new York in the late 1980s when her agency sent her to meet the star on the Cosby show set. Cosby offered to mentor her — even speaking to her parents — before eventually forcing himself on her.
32. Jewel Allison, writer
As A model in the late eighties, she assumed Cosby was going to put her on his TV show when her agent told her the star wanted to invite her out for dinner. ‘he asked me if I wanted a glass of wine; I took a few sips,’ she says. ‘And I started not feeling well . . . then he took my right hand, and he put it behind my back . . . ’
33. Lise-Lotte Lublin, former model
As a 23-year- old model, she assumed her appointment in his Las Vegas suite in 1989 was for an audition. After being given a couple of drinks, her last memory was of sitting on a table with Cosby straddling her. she doesn’t remember how she got home and didn’t realise she had been raped until she had gynaeological tests carried out 25 years later. she says she tried to file a police complaint in January, only to learn she should have done it years ago. .
34. Lili Bernard, artist
the young black actress appeared on the Cosby show in a 1992 episode and was ‘mentored’ by its star. she says he repeatedly drugged and raped her, on their last encounter threatening her so savagely she was in fear of her life. she later became suicidal and still suffers panic attacks. ‘I stand here to take back my power and to confront the fear that has paralysed me for so many years,’ she says.
35. Kacey (not her real name)
As An assistant to Cosby’s agent in the 1990s, she says she and the star became progressively friendlier. One day, she visited his studio bungal ow for lunch, where Cosby greeted her in a dressing gown and pestered her to take a large white pill, saying it would make her relax. she came to in bed with Cosby. ‘I really felt for all those years that it was just me, that I was alone,’ she says.
36. Unknown
One seat remains empty — dedicated to a yet unnamed alleged victim, who is yet to speak out.