Bill Cosby's Sexual Assault Conviction Overturned, Will Be Released From State Prison

Bill Cosby is being released from prison after the Pennsylvania Supreme Court vacated his conviction and ordered his immediate release.

What Happened: Cosby, 83, was arrested in 2015 for drugging and sexually assaulting Andrea Constand, a Canadian ex-professional basketball player, at his home in Elkins Park, Pennsylvania in 2004. The court case against Cosby ended in a mistrial in 2017, but he was retried and in 2018 was sentenced to 10 years in state prison.

In announcing the decision to vacate his conviction and release him from prison, the state’s high court ruled that two things considered warranted the voiding of his sentence:

• Cosby and the previous prosecutor in his case had an agreement that guaranteed he wouldn't face criminal trial if he testified in a civil deposition.
• The trial testimony of five women with similar stories to Constand created undue prejudice.

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What It Means: Cosby’s reputation as a beloved funnyman and popular consumer product spokesman was shattered when dozens of women publicly accused him of sexual assault. Cosby’s Kennedy Centers Honors were rescinded following his conviction and episodes of his sitcom “The Cosby Show” was removed from television syndication.

Cosby’s downfall was widely seen as a seminal moment in the #MeToo movement that led to the career downfall of powerful men including “Today” host Matt Lauer and film executive Harvey Weinstein.

More recently, the movement appears to have lost much of its power, most notably with New York Gov. Andrew Cuomo and Virginia Lt. Gov. Justin Fairfax, both Democrats, remaining in office despite facing public accusations of sexual assault. During the 2020 presidential election, Joe Biden’s campaign was unharmed after Tara Reade, a former staffer in Biden's U.S. Senate office, alleged that he sexually assaulted her in 1993 in a Capitol Hill office. Biden's predecessor Donald Trump also fended off accusations of sexual assault by multiple women during the 2016 campaign.

White House Press Secretary Jen Psaki was asked about the Cosby case in today’s press briefing and responded, “I don't have a direct response from the White House. The president has long been an advocate for fighting against violence against women and for raising voices of survivors.”

Photo: Bill Cosby in 2011 by the World' Affairs Council / Flickr Creative Commons.