Bill Cosby Admitted Drugging, Paying Off Women: 2005 Deposition Documents

Bill Cosby admitted to drugging women for sex and paying victims to hide his extramarital affairs, media reports said. Details of the 78-year-old’s multiple pursuits of women were revealed in 1,000 pages of deposition documents from a 2005 case.

Contrasted against his public persona as a comedian and moralist, Cosby’s past behavior was described in detail in a deposition obtained by the New York Times through a court-reporting service. The deposition came as part of a lawsuit filed by Andrea Constand, a former basketball coach at Temple University in Philadelphia, who reportedly was one of Cosby’s victims.

Cosby, who has publicly and repeatedly denied all accusations, admitted using drugs in assaulting women, the documents reveal. He described initially using Benadryl to sedate women for sexual acts, then using a much powerful sedative, quaaludes. Despite sexual misconduct, Cosby denied molesting women, as he suggested that all of his sexual encounters with women are consensual, which he picked up with nonverbal communication. “I think I’m a pretty decent reader of people and their emotions in these romantic sexual things, whatever you want to call them,” he said. Dolores M. Troiani, Constand’s lawyer, described Cosby's remarks as “making light of a serious situation.”

The 2005 lawsuit included 13 different unidentified witnesses who testified against Cosby.