Cosby Trial Will Proceed, Judge Won’t Drop Charges

03 Feb, 2016

A judge refused to throw out the sexual assault case against Bill Cosby on Wednesday, sweeping aside a former district attorney’s claim that he granted the comedian immunity from prosecution a decade ago.

Common Pleas Judge Steven O’Neill issued the ruling after a hard-fought two-day hearing, saying witness credibility was a factor. He did not elaborate.

In another setback for the defense, the judge also denied a request to disqualify newly elected District Attorney Kevin Steele from the case. Cosby’s lawyers had accused Steele of making a “political football” out of Cosby during the campaign.

Cosby, 78, was arrested in December and charged with drugging and violating former Temple University athletic department employee Andrea Constand at his suburban Philadelphia home in 2004. The TV star could get up to 10 years in prison if convicted.

Cosby held his head in his hands after the ruling, then left the courtroom, using a cane to descend the ornate marble staircase. He waved and smiled at supporters but had no comment. His lawyers put their arms on him to comfort him.

The next step is a preliminary hearing March 8 to determine whether prosecutors have enough evidence to put him on trial.

The charges represented an about-face by the district attorney’s office.

In 2005, then-District Attorney Bruce Castor decided the case was too flawed to prosecute. But Castor’s successors reopened the investigation last year after Cosby’s lurid, decade-old testimony from Constand’s civil suit was unsealed at the request of The Associated Press and after dozens of other women came forward with similar accusations that destroyed Cosby’s nice-guy image as America’s Dad.

Cosby’s lawyers tried to get the case thrown out with help from Castor, who testified at this week’s hearing that he intended to forever close the door on prosecuting the comedian. He said he considered his decision binding on his successors.

Similarly, Cosby’s lawyers said they never would have let the TV star testify in the civil case if they didn’t believe criminal charges were off the table.

“In this case, the prosecution should be stopped in its tracks,” Cosby lawyer Chris Tayback argued. “Really what we’re talking about here is honoring a commitment.”

Steele challenged Castor’s credibility and questioned whether the former DA ever made such an agreement, since it was never put in writing on a legal document and the Cosby attorney with whom Castor dealt is now dead. Steele argued that in any case, Castor had no legal authority to make such a deal.

“A secret agreement that allows a wealthy defendant to buy his way out of a criminal case isn’t right,” Steele told the judge.

 On the stand, Castor defended his decision not to bring charges, citing among other things Constand’s yearlong delay in going to police, her continued contact with Cosby, and suggestions that she and her mother might have tried to extort the comic.

While more than 50 women have accused Cosby of drugging and sexually assaulting them since the 1960s, the statute of limitations for prosecuting the comic has run out in nearly every instance. This is the only case in which he has been charged.

As the case goes forward, Cosby’s lawyers are expected to fight mightily to keep the deposition from being introduced at trial.

AP

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