Prosecutors push judge to let other Cosby accusers testify
NORRISTOWN, Pa. — Bill Cosby made his first court appearance of the #MeToo era on Monday as defence lawyers tried without success to get his sexual assault case thrown out, then turned their attention to blocking some of the 80-year-old comedian’s dozens of accusers from testifying at his looming retrial.
Prosecutors are trying to persuade the judge to allow as many as 19 other women to take the stand, including model Janice Dickinson, as they attempt to show the comedian had a long history of drugging and attacking women.
They’re also trying to insulate Cosby’s accuser, Andrea Constand, from what a prosecutor called “inevitable attacks” on her credibility.
Allowing other women to take the stand will show jurors that Cosby “systematically engaged in a signature pattern of providing an intoxicant to his young female victim and then sexually assaulting her when she became incapacitated,” Assistant District Attorney Adrienne D. Jappe told the judge.