Retrial date set in Bill Cosby sexual assault case

Retrial date set in Bill Cosby sexual assault case

Bill Cosby (l) will stand trial, again, on Nov. 6.; photo taken on Tuesday, June 13, 2017. Cosby and Andrew Wyatt, his spokesman.                     (POOL PHOTO)

By Stacy M. Brown

(NNPA Newswire Contributor)

Bill Cosby will face another criminal prosecution. A trial date of Nov. 6, 2017 has been set by Montgomery County Judge Steven O’Neill, the District Attorney announced via Twitter on Thursday.

In June, a 12-member jury split on whether to convict or acquit the entertainer on three counts of indecent aggravated assault stemming from an incident between Cosby and former Temple University employee Andrea Constant that happened more than a dozen years ago.

After more than 52 hours of deliberation, the panel alerted O’Neill that they could not reach a unanimous verdict. Prosecutor Kevin Steele immediately announced plans to retry the case. In 2015, Reuters reported that Steele “campaigned for district attorney on the promise of becoming the first in the United States to charge comedian Bill Cosby with sexual assault.”

Steele narrowly defeated Republican Bruce Castor for the seat; his margin of victory was less than a percentage point.

Tom Mesereau, the famous attorney who successfully defended actor Robert Blake in the murder of his wife and pop star Michael Jackson on child molestation charges, told TMZ that a retrial is a waste of taxpayers’ money and a gross waste of time.

“I predicted the mistrial. I thought the defense would win and they did a great job,” Mesereau said. “Whenever prosecutors lose, they immediately say they want a retrial. It’s a weak case and they should have known that.”

Mesereau continued: “It’s a very weak case and I think the judge helped Bill Cosby when he limited the other accusers who could testify in the case and, on the other hand, he helped the prosecution when the one witness the defense wanted to use to impeach the accuser, the judge wouldn’t let in.”

So far, neither Cosby nor his spokesman Andrew Wyatt, have commented on the retrial announcement.