Bill Cosby Sex Assault Trial: Judge Allows Only 1 Other Accuser to Testify, Not 13

Prosecutors wanted to call more women to the stand

Bill Cosby
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A judge ruled Friday that only one other accuser will be allowed to testify in Bill Cosby’s upcoming sexual assault trial, according to a court document obtained by TheWrap.

Prosecutors had planned to call 13 other women to the stand to testify against Cosby on charges that he drugged and raped them.

The trial stems from accusations made by former Temple University employee Andrea Constand, who claims Cosby assaulted her at his estate near Philadelphia in 2004. She will testify along with the one other accuser who says she was assaulted by Cosby in 1996.

Parts of Cosby’s testimony from a 2005 civil suit filed by Constand previously leaked to the media. In it, Cosby admitted that he had obtained Quaaludes to give to women with whom he wanted to have sex.

Cosby previously attempted to sue Constand, claiming that she violated a confidentiality agreement signed at the conclusion of the civil suit in 2006.

Among other things, Cosby’s suit claimed that Constand had violated the agreement with a pair of tweets published in 2014, as well as a 2015 interview with the Toronto Sun. However, Cosby and his legal team dropped that lawsuit in July.

After Constand’s rape accusations resurfaced in October 2014 following comments by comedian Hannibal Buress, dozens of women came forward claiming that Cosby sexually assaulted them over his lengthy career, typically drugging them beforehand.

Pamela Chelin contributed to this report. 

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