Bill Cosby Admitted Under Oath to Buying Drugs to "Use" on Women
According to the Associated Press, Bill Cosby said in a 2005 deposition that he bought Quaaludes with the intention of giving them to women he wanted to have sex with. In the same deposition, he reportedly admitted to giving drugs to a female former Temple University employee who filed a lawsuit accusing him of rape that same year. The suit claimed that the comedian drugged and raped the woman—later identified as Andrea Constand, the former director of operations for Temple’s women’s basketball program—at his Philadelphia mansion in 2004.
The Associated Press went to court to compel the release of the documents, and they were made public Monday. Cosby’s lawyers had objected on the grounds that it would embarrass their client.
The 77-year-old comedian was testifying under oath in a lawsuit filed by a former Temple University employee. He testified he gave her three half-pills of Benadryl.
The AP reports that Constand’s lawyer, Dolores M. Troiani, expressed doubt that the drug used on her client was actually Benadryl. Two other women reportedly testified that they knowing took Quaaludes from Cosby.
Constand’s lawsuit, which she filed with 11 other women in 2005, was settled out of court in 2006.
Since the lawsuit, Cosby has been accused of drugging and raping dozens of women. In December of last year, he finally resigned from the board of trustees at Temple, where he’d remained a popular figure. The 77-year-old has never been criminally charged with rape, in part because the statute of limitations has expired for most of the alleged assaults.
UPDATE 6:06 pm: From the Hollywood Reporter:
In a deposition on September 29, 2005, the comedian was asked, “When you got the Quaaludes, was it in your mind that you were going to use these Quaaludes for young women that you wanted to have sex with?”
“Yes,” responded Cosby.
UPDATE 6:31 pm: From the Associated Press:
Cosby had fought the AP’s efforts to unseal the testimony, with his lawyer arguing the deposition could reveal details of Cosby’s marriage, sex life and prescription drug use.
“It would be terribly embarrassing for this material to come out,” lawyer George M. Gowen III argued in June. He said the public should not have access to what Cosby was forced to say as he answered questions under oath from the accuser’s lawyer nearly a decade ago.
“Frankly ... it would embarrass him, (and) it would also prejudice him in eyes of the jury pool in Massachusetts,” Gowen said.
U.S. District Judge Eduardo Robreno ruled against Cosby last month, asking “Why would he be embarrassed by his own version of the facts?”
UPDATE 7:56 pm: Deadspin has a collection of the unsealed court documents here.
