Crime Stories with Nancy Grace - Bill Cosby verdict watch: Will ‘America’s dad’ go to jail?

Episode Date: June 13, 2017

Bill Cosby’s lawyers presented just a 6-minute-long defense against charges the comedian sexually assaulted Andrea Constand 13 years ago. What prosecutors call a drug-assisted rape, Cosby’s team said was a “relationship.” Jurors are deliberating the case, which Nancy Grace debates with defense lawyer Robin Ficker in this episode. Learn more about your ad-choices at https://www.iheartpodcastnetwork.comSee omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

This is an iHeart Podcast. Andrea Constance says that Bill Cosby sexually assaulted her January, February 2004. Cosby is charged with felony aggravated indecent assault. This is Crime Stories with Nancy Grace. Cosby has denied wrongdoing and says their encounter was consensual. Preying upon and exploiting my vulnerabilities, he then drugged and raped me. The 79-year-old has been accused by more than 50 women of drugging and or sexual misconduct. I've never seen anything like this. The judge is only allowing one other accuser to take the stand.

The comedian left court Monday night without a verdict. But with his spirit still intact. Closing arguments by the defense are done now what will go down in a pennsylvania courtroom in the case of so-called funny man bill cosby not as funny anymore i'm nancy grace this is crime stories thank you for being with us with me alan, Alan the Duke. Duke, joining me, and special guest, veteran attorney Robin Ficker. Robin, thank you for being with us. Before we get to your relationship, let me say, with Bill Cosby, I want to talk about the closing argument by the defense.

What was that? Well, each side was trying to pin the blame on the other. And Cosby's lawyers brought out her inconsistent statements, how she originally said it happened at their first meeting. Then it turned out that she had a number of meetings, shall we say, with Cosby over the year and a half. And then also all the phone calls that took place after the rape. You know, I've had rape cases, and I've never lost one where there were lots of phone calls between the rapee and the rapist after the event, there was obviously something going on, and it wasn't just talking about basketball with him being the trustee and her being the assistant to the team. And you say that because you, what, were a third-party participant in those phone calls?

I'm saying that there were phone calls. But you're stuttering and you're thinking on your feet trying to figure out what you can say because Andrea Constance testimony was powerful and credible and is in line with nearly 60 other women that say the same thing. Robin Ficker, veteran trial lawyer, you know very well the syndrome that rape victims and molestation victims go through, especially when they know their attacker. They very often try to pretend nothing happened in their own mind. It's hard for them to process it. They go about business as normal. They tell very few people, if anybody at at all and then slowly the burn starts and finally took about a year for andrea to tell her mother and all hell broke loose then when gian gianni constat found out what had happened to her daughter she gets Cosby on the phone and Cosby admits and about a two-hour conversation what happened and thought he would say mom mom don't don't be upset she had an

orgasm you know what really fell off my d-a-m-n-c-H-A-I-R when I heard that. Don't worry, Mom. You know what? I just wanted to snap his head off his neck when I heard that. That's a little chitchat between him and the mom. That's a little admission, Mr. Man. That is what we call an admission. He's admitting to Mom. He's admitting to mom.

He's trying to calm mom down. This is not an ordinary rape victim. This is a rape victim who had gotten a large financial settlement before and was looking for more. I'm curious, Robin Ficker, what is an ordinary rape victim? Well, but what? What's an ordinary rape victim? An ordinary rape victim is someone who indeed was raped. That's why she's not an ordinary rape victim, because she wasn't. It was consensual. You're so twisted up, you don't know which way to turn. They had been carrying on an affair for a time,

and then he paid her off because he didn't want his family, friends, and co-workers to find out about it. This is not uncommon. Yeah, you're right. That's exactly what happened. He paid her off because he didn't want people to find out that he raped her. You finally told the truth, Vicar. That's exactly what happened. He paid her off so nobody would find out that he raped her you finally told the truth Ficker that's exactly what happened he paid her off so nobody would find out and he kept that deposition under seal

and they fought tooth and claw to keep it under seal but then it came out I'll tell you my mad at Ficker uh in in addition to Bill Cosby is that that district attorney that, as the police said, shut down the investigation just as they were getting started and said, and I quote, it would put the parties in a bad light. Well, yeah, most felony charges do put you in a bad light. That part is true, but that is not a reason to drop charges. He dropped the charges because there was no bear there. I've represented a number of women who have tried to get settlements against wealthy men who have carried on affairs with them. These women have kept detailed notes of the liaisons, the napkins at the hotels they stayed at, and the men settle these so-called alimony suits simply because they don't want their relatives and their wife to know about the affairs they've been carrying on. Not because they've raped these women, because they don't want their wife to know about the affair in the first place.

And they've got money to spend, so they give it to the ladies who eagerly take it. So you're just projecting your sorry batch of clients onto Andrea Konstat, who was in touch with Bill Cosby. She was a head of the women's basketball and, well, on the staff. And he would call her and she would return calls because he was a Temple University trustee and the most famous one. And there was a lot of favoritism, you know, kind of like Tom Cruise and the Scientologist you know he walks in and bam everything is scoured with the toothbrush the night before same thing with Bill Cosby when it came to Temple University and of course she's going to return his calls and how if you look at

those phone records how many times is it just a call and leave a message because he you can't get through to him and right after that there's a business phone calls he's sandwiched in there so you know that that's not impressing me at all and anyone who has dealt with rape victims not just attacking them on cross-exam is familiar with the syndrome they go through, especially when it's not stranger on stranger. At first you think it's your fault. Then you beat yourself up. Why did I go along with that? What was that? Did I encourage that? Is that my fault? That guy wouldn't have done that to me. I mean, I know him. And then you start thinking about it and thinking about it. And then you realize it sinks in. If you let it, what has happened to you? She exhibited all of the signs

of PTSD. She lost weight. She quit her job. She moved out of town. She became withdrawn. She couldn't sleep. She had bad dreams when she did sleep and finally broke down and told her mother what had happened, not by some stranger that grabbed her in a dark alley, but by a man she trusted. I'm going to pause and thank our awesome sponsor, our partner in today's podcast, and I'll start with a story out of Racine, Wisconsin. A house catches on fire at nobody's home. It took a while for neighbors to even notice the problem, but at the end of the day, there were $40,000 damages. Priceless items, gone. Family heirlooms charred beyond recognition. If you're not home when a fire starts, who will be there to save your house, your belongings, your home? For SimpliSafe home security user Tricia, SimpliSafe was there.

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SimpliSafe.com slash Nancy. SimpliSafe.com slash Nancy for the 10% off your home security system. SimpliSafe.com slash Nancy. SimpliSafe, thank you for what you are doing for Americans that believe home security is unaffordable. It's not thanks to you. Now let's get back to the first question I asked a renowned defense attorney who's doing so well at dancing away from the question. What was that closing argument? A six minute fiasco. Talk about a quickie. Whoa. Well, because when you know that the other side hasn't made their case, you keep it short. You know, it was the prosecutor's argument was all the king's horses and all the king's men trying to put Humpty Dumpty together again. The length of the prosecution's closing statement was inversely proportional to the strength of their case.

And then they used the rape shield law to keep out all this damning evidence about her liaison with a celebrity NBA player before she met Cosby and then her liaison with a woman while she was dating him. Wait, wait, wait. What damning evidence that she had a relationship? That's the damning evidence? Or when they tried to tell the jury she was gay, as if somehow that would make her look bad? What damning evidence are you talking about? That she had sex before in her life? That she's not a virgin?

Okay, I'm a little underwhelmed. With the celebrity NBA player who she was going out with and trying to hit up too. Whoa, whoa, whoa. What do you mean trying to hit up? She is a gold. What do you mean she was trying to hit up an NBA player? Hit him up. What do you mean?

She was trying to have a liaison with him and then do the same thing that she did with Are you saying she asked somebody else for money i've seen these nba players and i'm talking about this case i'm trying to save you from a big fat lawsuit okay because i didn't hear any evidence andrea constant ever asked anybody else for money like an an NBA player that she may have had a relationship with? Are you saying, you did say she hit him up. Hit him up for what? Well, I'll say this.

I've known a lot of NBA players, and I've seen the groupies around them, and I know that when they see these guys walking into the game or into the club after the game they say here comes the gravy train and they they don't want that to get out in their crowd with with Cosby that's for sure so you have no evidence not even a scintilla a shred that she asked an NBA star for money okay so I guess what you're saying is you think the jury should have heard that she had a relationship with somebody else before Cosby? I'm not saying they should have, but they didn't. They didn't hear about that celebrity relationship. Well, let's bring in those other 60 women on Cosby. See how that works out. What's fair for the goose is fair for the gander.

None of that's been proved. The lady in this case waited a full year to bring her accusations. See, guys, this is why I love Robin Ficker. This is why I love Robin Ficker. You know, you knock him down, he stands right back up with a whole new argument. And he's like a snake charmer. If you listen, you'll start swaying right along with it. Hey, Ficker, tell me about your, quote, relationship with Cosby.

Well, I got a call from Cosby's crew to come up and be a contestant on You Bet Your Life. That was a game show that had been held by Groucho Marx prior to that. He was sort of a copycat, Cosby was. And there were three couples. My partner was a plant psychologist who would say nice things to plants to make them feel good. And then I was the person that criticized the plant. Cosby had a big pot of flowers. And there were three couples. We got the high score of the

three couples. We went on to ask and try to get the big money question, and we couldn't get it right. I couldn't think of the name of the prep school that Napoleon went to to learn his field tactics. What prep school was that? You know, I still can't remember. It might have been Eaton. It was a prep school that Napoleon supposedly won his later battles on. He won his battles on the playing fields of his prep school where he learned military tactics, supposedly. And Cosby was very charming. He was just as charming as he could be. I went to school in Philadelphia. He was revered there. He put Temple on the map. Everyone thought that it was a place where Jewish people go to church. He made it into a school that was nationally known. He was

on the board of trustees. He was revered in Pennsylvania, and he had people clustering around him just like they used to around Muhammad Ali. They would cluster around and try to get what they could. And what does that have to do with his rape case? Well, I'm just trying to say that she was looking for the gravy train, and they had a liaison over a period of time. What she did was not try to sue him or get money the first thing she did was go to police and try to do a criminal charge the police agreed and then the da to quote i'm quoting keep cosby from being cast in a quote bad light ordered the police to shut down the investigation luckily he's no longer

the da when that was shut down she waited a minute and then she decided to sue civilly since the system failed her that is what happened it was p.s the military school in breanne in the champagne region where napoleon learned his military tactics. But back to this trial. Let's talk about what's happened so far. So far the jury has already had a question. They asked the judge, Stephen O'Neill, to clarify what was meant by, quote, little friends, as Cosby described the three pills he gave Constand.

The prosecution talked about it in closings, and they asked a question about it. So far, they've been out for four hours, and that was their question. Now, honestly, can you take off your defense hat for just a minute? I'm trying to decipher what that question really means. They said that they wanted to quote clarify the context under which Cosby described the three pills he admitted he gave to Constant as quote little friends that was their question clarify the context under which he described them as little friends now let me ask you this thicker back to your contention that this was all voluntary why did he have to dope her up on quaaludes if it was voluntary it wasn't quaaludes it was benadryl no you're thinking of another claim made by some other phony he says it was

benadryl you think i believe that uh-uh He's lied to everybody in his life, including Camille, his wife, his entire life. Why should I think he's telling the truth to the jury now? He's going to lie to save his own skin. If he had the guts to testify, which he did not, he had his lawyer's life for him. That's what happened. Even if it were Benadryl, there was much, even if it were Quaaludes, there was much use of Quaaludes. Quaaludes! Quaaludes, not Quaaludes.

Quaaludes, there was much use of Quaaludes in dating situations. I've never had a Quaalude in a dating situation. Have you given women Quaaludes? No. Well, then it ain't that common is it if i hadn't done it and you haven't done it then it's not as common as you say quaaludes use of quaaludes at at the during that time was was quite common i don't know about giving quaaludes to women and then having sex on them when they were completely incapacitated i don't know how giving Quaaludes to women and then having sex on them when they were completely incapacitated.

I don't know how common that is. That sounds like a rape to me. She lied to the police the first time she went in to the police. No, she had her date wrong. She told them it happened on her very first date. She's a liar. She's a liar. You sound like a little parrot, Robin Thicker.

I usually get better out of you than going along with their kooky arguments. The judge gave the jury final instructions before they were sent back to their hotel. They deliberated until 9.30 at night. They wanted to go home for the night, O'Neal said. That's the judge. And he said he would normally have worked longer, but the jurors had already been in the courtroom for 13 hours. They had been sequestered during the duration of the trial, and Cosby left as well, looking tired, as he should for a man that I believe is about to go to jail you know uh he and his camp act like they're going to a photo shoot they walk in and

out beaming smiling chatting laughing quipping i think it's weird they're they're caught up in the celebrity look they they used to have his picture on a well-known restaurant in Washington, D.C., on the wall outside the restaurant, trying to get people to come in. He was the hero of Africa-America. He was their hero. He was the point man. He came before Obama. He was the Obama of an earlier time. This is what I can tell you, Mr. Ficker. Lady Justice is blind. She doesn't care, or she's not supposed to, whether you are rich or poor or middle of the road, whether you're white or black, man or woman, doesn't matter. So let's see what Lady Justice does with this one. And again, if you're not there when a fire starts, who will be there to save your home? With SimpliSafe Home Security, your smoke detectors immediately alert emergency services at the first sign of a fire.

Get 10% off your system today at SimpliSafe.com slash Nancy. That's SimpliSfe.com slash nancy that's simplisafe.com slash nancy i'm nancy grace climb stories along with robin ficker and alan deke signing off goodbye friend this is an iheart podcast