Former TV star Bill Cosby faces another trial for alleged sexual assault. Nine women have filed lawsuits in the US state of Nevada. In it they accuse the 85-year-old of having drugged her or made her weak-willed with alcohol and then sexually abused her, as the broadcaster CNN reports. These incidents are believed to have occurred between the late 1970s and early 1990s.
Nevada recently passed a law that abolishes the statute of limitations for sexual abuse cases. Other states, including New York and California, have also made similar changes in their laws.
Cosby “vehemently” rejects these allegations, his spokesman Andrew Wyatt told the German Press Agency. Wyatt’s statement said the women were fabricating allegations to potentially gain money and media fame.
Among the plaintiffs is ex-model Janice Dickinson. The 68-year-old previously said she was raped by Cosby in the 1980s. In 2018 she testified as a witness in a criminal case against Cosby in the US state of Pennsylvania. At the time, the jury saw it as proven that Cosby made a woman helpless with pills in 2004 and then sexually assaulted her. The former sitcom star (“The Bill Cosby Show”) was sentenced to several years in prison, but after about three years in prison he was released in 2021. The conviction was unexpectedly overturned due to a procedural error.
More than 60 women have accused Cosby of various kinds of sexual assault in the past few years. Most recently, an 80-year-old woman filed a civil lawsuit in Los Angeles in early June. the former playboyModel accuses Cosby of drugging her with pills at a restaurant in 1969 and then raping her.