Home free after his sexual assault conviction was overturned, Bill Cosby wants to keep it that way.
Lawyers for the actor asked the Supreme Court Monday to reject an appeal from a Pennsylvania prosecutor who wants the higher court to take another look at his criminal sex assault case.
The Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruled 4-3 in June to overturn Cosby’s conviction, saying that he was denied a fair trial when Montgomery County District Attorney Risa Vetri Ferman ignored a promise made by her predecessor, Bruce Castor, not to charge him if he agreed to testify in a civil suit brought by his alleged victim, Andrea Constand.
Cosby, 84, walked out of jail a free man on June 30 after three years behind bars.
“The Commonwealth fails to identify a single case from any court that conflicts with the Cosby decision,” his lawyer, Jennifer Bonjean, wrote in a 19-page filing Monday.
“In short, the Commonwealth’s petition offers no compelling reason for this Court to disrupt the state supreme court’s decision which is legally uncontroversial and based on a ‘rare, if not entirely unique’ set of circumstances unlikely to occur again in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania or elsewhere.”
Current Montgomery County DA Kevin Steele filed a petition with the Supreme Court in late November, asking the justices to review the decision and “right what we believe is a grievous wrong.”
The Pennsylvania court’s ruling, Steele wrote, set “a dangerous precedent.”
“A prosecution announcement not to file charges should not trigger due process protections against future criminal proceedings because circumstances could change, including new incriminating statements by the accused,” the prosecutor’s office argued.
Cosby has settled multimillion-dollar agreements with at least eight women over sexual assault allegations, but only Constand’s case led to criminal charges after she accused him of drugging and assaulting her at his home in January 2004.
In order for the case to get revisited by the Supreme Court, at least four of the nine justices would have to agree to hear it.
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