Bill Cosby’s Fate Rests With Jury as It Begins Deliberations

Bill Cosby’s Fate Rests With Jury as It Begins Deliberations
By GRAHAM BOWLEY and JON HURDLE
APRIL 25, 2018

 

NORRISTOWN, Pa. — Jurors in the Bill Cosby sexual assault retrial began their deliberations Wednesday, sifting through evidence they heard during 12 days of testimony and arguments in an effort to determine whether Andrea Constand had been molested by the once-popular entertainer.

 

Last summer jurors spent six days deliberating that question at the Montgomery County Courthouse before Judge Steven T. O’Neill agreed they were hopelessly deadlocked and sent them home.

 

Judge O’Neill, who is presiding at this retrial, charged the jury Wednesday morning. Deliberations began around 11 a.m. and dragged into the night as the 12-member panel considered the presentations by prosecutors and defense lawyers.

 

The latter argued that Ms. Constand, a former Temple University employee who viewed Mr. Cosby as a mentor, had a consensual sexual encounter with Mr. Cosby at his home near here in 2004. But they said she later concocted a story about having been assaulted to pressure him into a financial settlement.

 

Prosecutors said it was Mr. Cosby, now 80, who was the manipulator, a man who hid behind a genial image, they said, while using drugs to incapacitate and assault not just Ms. Constand, but other women as well....

 

Mr. Cosby is charged with three counts of aggravated indecent assault: penetration with lack of consent; penetration while unconscious; and penetration after administrating an intoxicant. Each is a felony that could carry up to 10 years in prison if he is convicted....
https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/25/arts/television/bill-cosby-sexual-assault-trial.html