Bill Cosby spoke out on Friday for the very first time since his sexual assault trial began. He thanked the jury and his supporters. The jury will head into the sixth day of deliberations on Saturday.
Bill Cosby spoke out on Friday for the very first time since his sexual assault trial began, as the jury is set to head into their sixth day of deliberations.
‘Please, to the supporters, stay calm do not argue with people. Just keep up the great support, ‘ Cosby said to a crowd of fans and reporters as he left the courthouse.
He then thanked the seven men and five women jurors for their time.
‘I want to thank the jury for their long days and their honest work, ‘ Cosby said.
Cosby then got into his vehicle and gave a thumbs up from the car window as he and his team drove away.
The jurors have been deliberating for more than 50 hours — a length of time ‘beyond the point of free will, ‘ according to defense attorney Brian McMonagle.
They will return Saturday morning for the sixth day of deliberations.
The prosecution of Cosby could be hovering on the brink of collapse as the jury remain locked in deliberations with no word of an imminent verdict.
In a day in which the defense has renewed their already vigorous argument for Judge Steven O’Neill to declare a mistrial, he has staunchly defended his stance of allowing the jury to attempt to reach a unanimous consensus.
O’Neill rejected McMonagle’s motion this morning stating: ‘I have heard absolutely nothing from the jury with any issue about how they are deliberating, any issue of coercion.’
He said there was a ‘misperception that there is some rule of law that there is a time limit’ and challenged McMonagle to bring him the case law that proves anything different.
With jurors looking exhausted — and one appearing to doze at one point- the length of deliberation has now exceeded the length of time it took to deliver all the testimony.
O’Neill dismissed the jury for the night at 9.15pm. ‘Your questions indicate that you’re working, ‘ he said. ‘If you’re not then you will let me know.’ They will resume deliberations Saturday morning at 9am.
In their effort to reach a consensus the jurors asked five questions of the court on Friday.
They wanted to know the definition of reasonable doubt, re-hear the section of Cosby’s deposition regarding his use of Quaaludes, the telephone conversations between Andrea Constand’s mother and Cosby, and Constand’s testimony about her phone records regarding contact with Cosby.
But when they asked for a section of Gianna Constand’s testimony regarding her telephone call to Cosby two days after her daughter told her of the alleged attack to be re-read a second time — just moments after hearing it read in full — O’Neill drew the line.
Instead he told them to go back and rely upon their ‘collective recollection’.
The sense of mounting frustration and desperation for this case to be done was compounded by McMonagle when, shortly after 8.30pm, he once again asked for a mistrial as the jury came back with yet another request for testimony to be re-read after 53 hours of deliberation and one declaration of deadlock.
Addressing the judge after the court heard the jury ask to hear the testimony of Constand’s brother-in-law, Stuart Parsons, McMonagle said: ‘They said they were deadlocked 2 days ago. At this point they’ve been asking for read-backs now they’re asking for a read-back of somebody’s testimony in its entirety.’
He implored: ‘I believe this jury is tired, it’s weary, they’ve been deliberating 12-hour days they believe they are being compelled to come back with a verdict.’
With growing frustration he continued: ‘I say respectfully I represent the defendant. His liberty’s at stake and… what I’m seeing I’ve never seen before. I’m concerned that whatever this verdict is there are going to be jurors compromising their values just for the sake of coming back with a verdict when they don’t have to.’
In an extraordinary exchange before the jurors were led back into the court to hear the testimony once more O’Neill told McMonagle: ‘Maybe they’re deadlocked just to the point that most of them want an acquittal.
‘You don’t know what it is and that’s why I’m wondering why anybody’s making a motion for a mistrial when a jury’s deliberating.’
But McMonagle persisted voicing his concern that the jury was not aware that they could come back with a second deadlock. He said: ‘I think they don’t know that they can’t say [that] . They’ve already said they’re deadlocked. I don’t think they know they can say it again and go home.’
He pointed out that his was not ‘a 900 count indictment on a white collar [financial] crime, ‘ but instead an ‘uncomplicated’ case of aggravated sexual assault that took five days of eight hours of testimony to try’.
Exasperated O’Neill responded: ‘I feel your passion. I understand where you’re coming from. I just have no precedence.’
McMonagle begged to differ citing a case that led O’Neill to withhold his ruling on a mistrial until he had researched it.
O’Neill allowed the jury to hear Parson’s testimony once more in which the police officer told the court that he had advised mother-in-law, Gianna Constand, to record conversations with Cosby.
Friday morning, the jury asked to rehear Cosby’s own testimony about how he stockpiled Quaaludes with the intention of giving them to women with whom he wanted to have sex but denied drugging them without their knowledge.
The testimony was given to Constand’s lawyer Dolores Troiani in 2005 as part of the civil law suit and was unsealed in 2015 sparking a media firestorm and re-opening of the criminal case.
They heard his admission to having given Quaaludes to Therese Serignese — who was in court alongside fellow accusers — after meeting her at the Hilton Hotel in Las Vegas. She claims that after taking the pills he sexually assaulted her.
They heard that he had seven prescriptions for Quaaludes over two or three years in the seventies but had no intention of taking them himself.
Asked, ‘Was it in your mind that you were going to use these Quaaludes on young women that you wanted to have sex with, plural’ he responded, ‘Yes.’
They heard how he passed off his practice of giving them to women as socially acceptable at the time and described it as ‘the same as you say have a drink.’
He said, ‘Quaaludes happened to be the drug that young people, kids were partying with and I wanted to have them just in case.’
When asked if he had ever given Quaaludes to a man, Cosby answered, ‘No.’
At one point after repeated questioning as to whether he gave Quaaludes to women other than Teresa, Cosby asked to have it put on the record that he was ‘confused.’
O’Neill then defined Reasonable Doubt reminding the jury that although the Commonwealth has the burden of proof, ‘it does not mean it must prove beyond all doubt to a mathematic certainty.’
He also reminded them that it ‘must be a real doubt, not an imagined one, nor one manufactured to avoid carrying out an unpleasant duty’.
The jury returned after lunch to re-hear testimony given by Constand’s mother, Gianna, about the two hour telephone conversation she had with Cosby on 15 January 2005, two days after her daughter made the allegations that he had drugged and sexually assaulted her.
O’Neill refused to re-read a specific section of Gianna Constand’s testimony regarding the telephone conversation she had with Cosby after Constand made her allegations.
Mrs Constand had described the conversation as ‘aggressive’ and revealed the uncomfortable fact that Cosby had addressed her as ‘mom’ throughout the call in which he told her what he had done to her daughter in explicit detail.
The court heard again Mrs Constand’s assertion that she had asked Cosby what he had given her daughter and that he told her he couldn’t read the prescription bottle but would write it down and mail it. It was a promise he did not keep.
Mrs Constand told the court she had asked Mr Cosby ‘Why would you drug her? Why would you have her sleep like that?’ She said she told him she thought he was her daughter’s friend.
They heard how she had testified that Cosby tried to manipulate the notion of ‘consent’ and said ‘don’t worry mom there was no penile penetration only digital’.
She recalled that he had added: ‘And mom she even had an orgasm’ and that at she listened to his words she was ‘fuming’.
She went onto claim that Cosby had asked Constand, who was also on the call, ‘Andrea do you remember?’ Her mother told the court Constand uttered three words, ‘I…. I…. I’ before hanging up.’
After lengthy conversation about his personal life she said he had admitted that he was a ‘sick man’. At another stage in the call he referred to himself as a ‘dirty old man’ and conceded that he sounded ‘like a perverted person’.
According to Constand she had ‘zero tolerance for game-playing’ and when Cosby realized ‘the game was up’ he apologized.
The jury also heard lengthy testimony concerning telephone records of calls between Constand and Cosby in the days and weeks following the night of the alleged assault. She had initially told investigators that she had no contact with him afterwards.
At 3.13pm on Thursday, more than 46 hours into their deliberations, the judge sent the jury back to the jury room with the instructions to ‘continue to deliberate for as long as you are actively deliberating’.
The jurors returned to court Friday morning with two questions — their seventh and eighth since deliberations began Monday evening.
Those questions were about the definition of reasonable doubt and Cosby’s sealed testimony that was opened.
After the jurors were dismissed, O’Neill told the court: ‘I don’t know if we’ll be five minutes or five hours.’
The question came after less than 20 minutes into the fifth day of deliberations that stalled Thursday morning when they told the judge that they were at a deadlock.
O’Neill noted that the question showed that the jurors were deliberating as requested and prosecutors welcomed it viewing it as a sign of ‘progress’ and that thing were ‘moving in the right direction’.
When Constand and her mother, Gianna, walked into the courtroom at around 9.45am on Thursday her fellow accusers who have swelled in numbers as the days have gone on, stood as a mark of respect.
Cosby smiled and waved to fans as he arrived to court flanked by his spokesman Andrew Wyatt.
On Thursday, Wyatt held a press conference in which he called for O’Neill to ‘put and end’ to this trial just minutes before O’Neill called the jury into dismiss them for the night. It was a move that infuriated the judge.
Before bringing in the jury O’Neill addressed Cosby. He reminded him he was still under oath when he asked Cosby to confirm that the multiple motions for dismissal filed by McMonagle were being done with his consent and that he fully understood the consequences of a mistrial filed on the grounds of Manifest Necessity — a jury’s failure to reach a unanimous consensus.
He said: ‘If you request a mistrial based on Manifest Necessity, when a jury is unable to come to a unanimous verdict the consequence if a mistrial is declared and the Commonwealth seeks to retry you is that you would not be able on that ground to claim Double Jeopardy.’
Speaking in a strong clear voice Cosby said that he did understand.
Earlier in what appeared to be a clear dig at Wyatt’s proclamation O’Neill said that Cosby’s counsel had assured him that they were not behind and had not directed his appeal to end the trial now.
McMonagle has now filed for a mistrial five times — four on grounds of Manifest Necessity.
Confusion reigned in the courtroom Thursday as a clearly frustrated and unusually stern O’Neill brought in the jury to tell them 9PM, ‘was long enough to deliberate for this day’ before immediately sending them back to continue their deliberations.
The move was met with gasps from the bemused court onlookers and officials, with defense attorney McMonagle turned from the bench to the courtroom with a look of disbelief.
Many saw the bizarre move as a rebuke to the jury that has yet to come to a unanimous consensus on any of the three counts of aggravated indecent assault.
He said: ‘I assume that in keeping with the last instruction you are deliberating with that instruction.
‘Again 9 o’clock is long enough to deliberate for this day. With that said you may return to your deliberations.’
Within minutes of the jury leaving Judge O’Neill called the jury back in and barely five minutes later the unsmiling judge delivered the cautionary instructions — regarding the restrictions by which they must abide and with which he has dismissed the jury each night of deliberations that began on Monday evening.
