Jurors in Bill Cosby's sexual assault trial heard a deposition from the comedian and accused rapist Friday in which he expressed fear that his alleged victim's mother viewed him as a "dirty old man," the Washington Postreported. Phone conversations between Cosby and Gianna Constand circa 2005 had previously been played for the jurors, but the reading of the decade-old deposition Friday added context regarding Cosby's intentions. Gianna is the mother of Andrea Constand, who was allegedly drugged and assaulted by Cosby in 2004.
The deposition, which the Post said was compiled during multiple sessions in 2005 and 2006, was read to the Norristown, Pennsylvania courtroom by a Montgomery County police officer. "I'm thinking this is a dirty old man with a young girl," Cosby said, according to the deposition. "The mother is coming at me for being a dirty old man."
Passages from the deposition regarding Cosby's quaaludes admission were not presented to jurors. Cosby himself has not taken the stand, but Deadlinereported Friday that his legal team hadn't ruled out the possibility of testimony. The defense has highlighted Constand's decision to refrain from reporting the alleged sexual assault for almost a year, but a prosecution witness pushed back against this criticism Friday.
An expert on sexual assault explained to the court that victims, due to trauma, often delay reporting such incidents or never report them at all. "Victims want to forget about it and pretend it didn't happen," Dr. Veronique Valliere said, according to the New York Times. An alleged attacker who's a celebrity or public figure, Dr. Valliere added, often places the victim in a position of having to take on "a lot of responsibility" for that person's reputation.
