Comedian Bill Cosby will not face criminal charges on two separate allegations of sexual assault. On Wednesday, Los Angeles County prosecutors declined to charge Cosby, 78, with two separate sexual assault claims in 1965 and 2008, citing the statute of limitations and lack of evidence.
USA News reports that in the 1965 case, the accuser claimed she met Cosby at a jazz club in Hollywood. He gave her an alcoholic drink, took her to a house, and forced her to have sex with him. The more recent 2008 case involves 25-year-old model, Chloe Goins, who claimed she was 18 when Cosby drugged and molested her while at a party in the Playboy Mansion. Goins said she met Cosby at the party and he gave her and her friend a drink. She felt dizzy and sick afterwards and Cosby offered to help her lie down in a room where she became unconscious. According to The Daily Mail, when Goins woke up she was naked, and Cosby was biting her toes with his pants down to his ankles. Cosby's lawyers claimed their client was not in the same party at that time.
Both cases were dismissed on the grounds of expired statute of limitations and insufficient evidence to prove Cosby's guilt beyond a reasonable doubt. According to Deadline, a charge evaluation worksheet from the office of LA County District Attorney Jackie Lacey says, "Filing the crime of forcible rape is barred by the statute of limitations and as such, any consideration of a criminal filing is prohibited by law."
The court's decision comes a week after Cosby was charged with drugging and sexually assaulting Andrea Constand in 2004 inside his home in Pennsylvania. This is the first and only criminal case where he was charged after dozens of women came forward with allegations ranging from sexual assault and sexual harassment, to rape that spanned decades. These claims have since destroyed his good guy image. Cosby's lawyers called the 2004 charges unjustified and are confident he will be exonerated.
Earlier, prosecutors rejected filing charges against Cosby based on a lawsuit filed by Judy Huth. Huth claims she was 15 when she was sexually assaulted by Cosby at the Playboy Mansion in the early 1970s. On Wednesday, the LA court also ruled not to depose Cosby in a defamation suit filed by former model Janice Dickinson. Dickinson claims Cosby drugged and raped her in Lake Tahoe, California in 1982. On the same day, the judge also ruled to delay the deposition of Cosby's wife, Camille, in a defamation case filed by seven women, accusing him of sexual assault.
Cosby is best known for his comedic acts in "The Cosby Show," which aired from 1984 to 1992. The sitcom was rated as the number one TV show in America for five years. At the height of his fame, he was the highest paid comedian in the U.S.
