Cosby being 'smeared'

NEW YORK • Bill Cosby's lawyers fought back on Tuesday, asserting in a legal filing that news media accounts had inaccurately portrayed him as having testified that he used powerful sedatives to drug women so he could molest them.

In the comedian's first public defence since parts of his deposition in a 2005 lawsuit became public this month, his lawyers said he had actually "admitted to nothing more than being one of the many people who introduced Quaaludes into their consensual sex life in the 1970s".

The court filing said: "Quaaludes were a highly popular recreational drug in the 1970s, labelled in slang as 'disco biscuits' and known for their capacity to increase sexual arousal."

The lawyers cited several news articles that they contended had misconstrued Cosby's testimony, and they blamed the woman who had accused him of drugging and molesting her in 2005, Temple University basketball manager Andrea Constand. The case was settled in 2006 and the parties had agreed to keep documents from the case confidential as part of the settlement.

Ms Constand, the lawyers said, was now trying to "smear the defendant".

NEW YORK TIMES

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A version of this article appeared in the print edition of The Straits Times on July 23, 2015, with the headline Cosby being 'smeared'. Subscribe