Philadelphia (AP) — Prosecutors ask the U.S. Supreme Court to reconsider the decision overturning Bill Cosby’s sexual assault conviction, setting a dangerous precedent if the press release is treated as a disclaimer. Insisted on a petition that could be done.
Cosby’s lawyers have long argued that when he gave a damaging testimony in a whistleblower’s civil proceedings in 2006, he relied on a promise that he would never be prosecuted.
The only written evidence of such a promise was a 2005 press release from then-prosecutor Bruce Caster, who stated that there was not enough evidence to arrest Cosby.
This release contained an ambiguous “caution” that Castor would “reconsider this decision if necessary.” Since then, both parties have spent years discussing what that means.
“This decision as it stands will have widespread adverse effects beyond Montgomery County and Pennsylvania. The US Supreme Court can correct what we believe to be a serious mistake,” said Montgomery. County District Attorney Kevin Steele wrote in a petition seeking Supreme Court review under the adequacy provisions of the United States Constitution.
Prosecutors also complain that the Supreme Court justice of the State High Court appears to misrepresent important facts in the case when discussing the court’s decision. Overturned Cosby’s belief in a television interview..
Caster’s successor, who gathered new evidence and arrested Cosby in 2015, says it falls far short of a lifetime immunity agreement. They also suspect that Castor has ever made such a deal. Instead, they say that even if Cosby backfired when “he slipped” in his rambling testimony, he had a strategic reason to pray instead of exercising his right to remain silent. increase.
However, the defense lawyer states that the proceedings should never have been brought to justice because they called it a “non-indictment agreement.”
Cosby, 84, was the first celebrity to be convicted of sexual assault during the #MeToo era when a jury pleaded guilty to drug and molester to college sports manager Andrea Constant in a 2018 retrial. became.
He spent nearly three years in prison before the Pennsylvania Supreme Court released him in June.
Steel’s bid to revive the case is a long shot. The US Supreme Court accepts less than 1% of petitions received. However, legal scholars and victim advocates are closely watching whether the court is interested in the hottest #MeToo case.
Two court judges, Clarence Thomas and Brett Kavanaugh, were accused of sexual misconduct at a confirmation hearing of a fierce conflict.
The Appeal Judge expressed a very different view of the Cosby case. An intermediate state court upheld the conviction. Next, seven judges from the Pennsylvania Supreme Court wrote three separate opinions.
The majority found that when Cosby admitted that he had given a series of young women drugs and alcohol before a sexual encounter, he relied on a decision not to prosecute him. The court did not admit that there was such an agreement, but Cosby said he believed there was such an agreement.
However, prosecutors call the conclusion flawed. They say Cosby’s lawyer violently opposed the testimony-taking question rather than letting him speak freely.
Cosby himself has never testified to any agreement or promise. The only participant allegedly mentioned earlier is Steele’s political rival, Caster, who continued to represent President Donald Trump in the second impeachment trial. Caster said he had promised Cosby’s dead defense lawyer, but received no reward.
He never mentioned it to top assistant Lisa Farman, who led the investigation into Cosby.
She later became a district attorney and resumed the case in 2015 after a federal judge opened Cosby’s testimony record.
At a notable preliminary hearing in February 2016, Caster spent hours giving his defense testimony. He said he typed a press release himself after business hours, which was intended to convey a different layer of meaning to lawyers, the media, and the general public.
The judge decided he was unreliable and brought the case to trial.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court, in a June 30 ruling, called Cosby’s arrest a “fundamental insult to justice.”
A few weeks later, the ruling prompted the state prosecutor to dismiss charges against prison guards accused of sexually abusing female prisoners.
A groundbreaking black actor and comedian, The Cosby created the top-ranked “The Cosby Show” in the 1980s. The barrage of alleged sexual assaults later destroyed his image as an “American dad” and led to a multi-million dollar court reconciliation with at least eight women. However, constant was the only case leading to criminal accusations.
Five of them testified about the indictment in support of Constant’s allegations, and that Cosby’s lawyers also challenged the appeal. However, the state high court refused to address the thorny issue of the number of other whistleblowers who could testify in criminal cases before the evidence became unfair to the defense.
In recent memoirs, Constant called the verdict that it was not as important as the growing support for survivors of sexual assault inspired by the #MeToo movement.
“The outcome of the trial seemed strangely unimportant, as if the world had changed in a more important way again,” Constant wrote in the book The Moment.
Follow Maryclaire Dale on Twitter. https://twitter.com/Maryclairedale.
Copyright 2021 AP communication. all rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed without permission.
Bill Cosby’s Prosecutor Asks US Supreme Court to Review Case | National News
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