The most recent Bill Cosby lawsuit illustrates why we have statutes of limitations
[NOTE: I’ve written many previous posts about the various cases against Bill Cosby.]
Defendants need to be able to have access to evidence against them, and to be able to find witnesses for their side if such witnesses exist. Memory is often flawed, but over time it becomes more flawed. Those are some of the reasons there are statutes of limitations for most causes of action, and they are especially important in civil suits because the burden of proof required for a guilty verdict is lower than in criminal cases.
But California decided to pass this curious law:
On January 1, 2023, California expanded its statute of limitations for sexual assault claims, which permits survivors to file legal claims for a sexual assault that happened years ago.
In the past decade, in large part thanks to the impact of the #MeToo movement, sexual assault survivors have come forward in increasing numbers. Undoubtedly in response to this movement, California has repeatedly redefined its statute of limitation for sexual assault cases to give survivors more opportunities to take legal action. Some of California’s changes permanently increase the period of time a survivor can bring a civil claim for sexual assault. Other changes temporarily open a “lookback” window during which a survivor can bring a civil claim for sexual assault that had otherwise expired. …
In California, regardless of whether the survivor has reported the sexual assault to the police, the survivor can pursue a civil claim for sexual assault.
The usual limitation is 10 years. But the law carved out a special “lookback” for adult victims of assaults that were alleged to have occurred between January 1, 2009, and January 1, 2019, which permitted civil claims for sexual assault to be filed beginning on January 1, 2023 and ending on December 31, 2026.
But that wasn’t the end of it – the law was further extended:
For survivors of sexual assaults that occurred prior to January 1, 2009, AB 2777 opened a one-year “lookback” window – from January 1, 2023, through December 31, 2023 – for a sexual assault survivor to file suit if an entity responsible for their harm had covered up a prior alleged sexual assault by the perpetrator. …
A “cover up” in this context, is a “concerted effort” to hide evidence, including efforts to prevent information from becoming public or incentivizing individuals to remain silent. It can include the use of a nondisclosure agreement or a settlement agreement.
Importantly, AB 250 also clarifies that a survivor can bring their claims against the perpetrator under this provision, even if the perpetrator was not involved in the cover-up.
During that particular look-back period a lawsuit was filed against Cosby for an alleged assault in 1972. That’s over fifty years earlier. The plaintiff has just been awarded big damages:
A civil jury in California found Monday that Bill Cosby was liable for drugging and sexually assaulting a woman in 1972 and awarded her $59.25 million.
After a nearly two-week trial in Santa Monica, jurors found Cosby, 88, liable for the sexual battery and assault of Donna Motsinger. They awarded her $17.5 million in past damages and $1.75 million for future damages, including “mental suffering, loss of enjoyment of life, inconvenience, grief, anxiety, humiliation, and emotional distress.”
Then in a second phase of the trial Monday afternoon, they awarded an additional $40 million in punitive damages. …
Motsinger had been a server at a restaurant in Sausalito near San Francisco who said in her lawsuit, filed in 2023, that Cosby had invited her to his stand-up comedy show at a theater in nearby San Carlos. Both were in their 30s at the time. She said Cosby gave her wine and two pills that she believed were aspirin, and that she was going in and out of consciousness as two men put her in a limousine.
“She woke up in her house with all her clothes off, except her underwear on – no top, no bra, and no pants,” the lawsuit said. “She knew she had been drugged and raped by Bill Cosby.”
In court filings, Cosby’s lawyers argued that the allegations rested almost entirely on speculation and assumption, saying Motsinger “freely admits that she has no idea what happened.” …
Cosby did not testify at the trial, whose witnesses included Andrea Constand, the Temple University sports administrator he was convicted of sexually assaulting in a Pennsylvania criminal court in 2018. The state’s Supreme Court threw out the verdict and Cosby was freed from prison after serving nearly three years of a three- to 10-year sentence.
Motsinger first made her allegations anonymously in a 2005 lawsuit filed by Constand.
So you can see that Motsinger only came forward after some of the other suits were filed.
It’s not easy to get more facts than that about what evidence was presented. Some of the articles are behind paywalls, so if anyone can find further evidence I’d like to hear it.
This article mentions that Cosby gave a deposition saying he could not remember what had happened with Motsinger – so it seems neither of them can really remember if a rape occurred. He is 88 right now and the plaintiff is 84. Whether he is guilty or innocent, this “looking back” law is absurd and dangerous. The plaintiff may not recover much money because he is alleged to have little at this point. Maybe the lawyers will get what he does have.
In this post from 2018 on the topic of a previous Cosby case, I wrote the following, which seems equally relevant now:
To turn to that other court, the court of public opinion—a lot of people have pointed out that cases like that of Roy Moore and Harvey Weinstein have accustomed us to think that the accusations of one person are stronger if there are other, similar accusations. Now, we reap the dubious “benefits” of that with Kavanaugh, where even the most suspect accusations are strengthened (in the eyes of some people, anyway) when there’s more than one accuser. But weak, suspect accusations are weak and suspect no matter how many there are. What makes accusations especially weak or suspect? Sketchy memory, a long previous silence, a political and/or financial motive for making the claim, and reading about other claims from other women giving the new accuser ideas for a similar set of charges. It’s not hard to do for anyone who may have had any prior encounter with the accused, and who has the motivation.
I don’t know what other evidence Motsinger provided. Maybe there’s a paper trail of allegations of some sort that would tend to corroborate her story. If so, I haven’t seen it, although that would make her case much stronger. Nevertheless, the fact that it occurred over fifty years ago makes it virtually impossible to defend against.
Why not just call it the “Trump Law” (or maybe the “Trump-Cosby Law”)?
(Makes sense that it’s California…or NY, in Trump’s case…)
And so, coming soon to a blue state near you?
…though being so perverse, I wonder if it can be challenged right up to SCOTUS…
Hey, speaking about perverse—and illegal!
…Here’s Julie Kelly:
https://instapundit.com/785025/
Note well the phrase, “sexual assault survivors”. This is agit prop. All victims of alleged sexual assault ARE SURVIVORS. Sexual encounters, consensual or otherwise, do not end in death; if they do, the rightful charge is murder.
Jack Smith should go work for Putin. So horribly corrupt is he. Note how Putin treats adversaries: his oppo critic, Navalny, was incarcerated in Moscow’s “Psychiatric Hospital #3” within hours of his strong, public anti-Putin words.
We need more testosterone in law and politics to combat toxic feminism. It’s visible here as STILL Believe ALL Women at all times and about everything, despite Amber Heard’ schelacking by Johnny Depp.
“the fact that it occurred over fifty years ago makes it virtually impossible to defend against.”
It’s so unconstitutional as to be not just absurd but maliciously so. Making it not a bug but a feature. The ‘moral’ being that only when women rule unchallenged and worldwide will there be peace. The irony is literally Shakespearean, nothing can enable Islam’s triumph more surely than to geld the Western male.
I doubt the CA law was specifically to get Cosby, but the NY law seemed to be crafted so that Trump could be prosecuted. Basically a bill of attainder.
I am reminded of the long ago charges recently made public against Cesar Chavez.
A case like this is another reminder that soi-disant feminists have almost no history of promoting decent causes.
Off topic, but major international bad news: https://www.wsj.com/opinion/the-iran-wars-other-energy-shortagefood-9be83005?
Thank goodness for the USA.
CICERO is absolutely and completely correct in this matter: The phrase “sexual assault survivors” is nothing but agitprop. As he says, victims of sexual encounters who do not die as a result, whether the encounters are consensual or not, are not distinguishable as being survivors. They are unarguably victims, of course.
But living human beings, in fact, are–without exception–survivors. We remain so until the day we die.
Don’t expect any relief from the CA S. CT.
I think the word “survivor” is used in the general sense of, for example: “it didn’t break my life; I was able to maintain or develop a productive life and have good relationships with men sexually and otherwise; i didn’t kill myself – in other words, I survived and even prospered after a very traumatic and deeply personal experience.”
Of course, in a case such as that of the plaintiff here, she gets more money if she claims she was emotionally disabled for many decades after the experience and perhaps even permanently. And sometimes that is true. Different people have different degrees of resilience.
It’s not just that cases like this cannot be defended against; Since no real evidence is presented, there is very little to refute.
To me, more importantly: How does one appeal a case like this? It would seem to place the defendant not only in a position of being unable to defend themselves, but it also appears to severely limit the ability to appeal an unfair case, which is fundamental to our system of justice.
I think the word “survivor” is used in the general sense of, for example: “it didn’t break my life…”
Maybe, but I think it’s also another case of exploiting holocaust language, as with the word “denier.” So we have “holocaust survivor” and “sexual assault survivor”; “holocaust denier” and “climate change denier.” While the first is intended to dramatize, the second to belittle.