Bill Cosby Accuser Andrea Constand: 'I Am Here for Justice'

NORRISTOWN, Pennsylvania—For a second time, Andrea Constand took the stand and calmly and methodically told a jury about the night she said famous comedian Bill Cosby drugged and sexually assaulted her. She went over the same narrative as last year’s trial, which ended with a hung jury, but this time was different. Her testimony was more precise and sharp. There was new audio of another person, then with the William Morris Agency, wanting to talk to Constand about a meeting with Cosby. And prosecutors also asked Constand questions meant to counteract the defense’s narrative that she was a lying gold digger.

Answering questions from prosecutor Kristen Feden, Constand talked about the fear she felt afterward for herself and her family, why she reached out lawyers for help, as well as why her job meant she had to keep talking to Cosby after the night she says she was assaulted.

One of the first questions Constand was asked was about the financial settlement she received from Cosby after her civil suit. Constand told the jury that, yes, she had settled for $3.38 million but she had no other lawsuits pending against Cosby. Constand noted she was not being paid to testify and would not be paid for the time she was missing from work. The next question from Feden was, “Why are you here?” Constand replied, “For justice.”

From there, Constand gave similar testimony to last year. She was director of basketball operations for Temple University, and Cosby was one of the university’s most prominent boosters. She met Cosby through her job and then he kept in touch with her, offering her advice and mentorship. While Constand talked about her job at Temple, Feden asked her questions about Marguerite “Margo” Jackson, a possible defense witness who will say that she was rooming with Constand on a Temple road trip when Constand told her she could set up a famous person for money with a sexual assault claim.

Constand testified that when she traveled for Temple she roomed on her own. Constand said she did not recall ever rooming with Jackson.

Constand talked about the several times she saw Cosby outside of Temple to talk about her career, and possibly moving into sports broadcasting. The first time she went to his house, where she said he made a pass at her, putting his hand on her leg. Constand wasn’t offended, she said, but thought it was odd. When Constand went to his home for a second time, to meet some other people in the community, he did nothing inappropriate. Constand also kept talking to him on the phone, which she said was part of her job.

“He just wanted to be updated on what was going on around Temple sports,” Constand said. “I was a person that he called to just get some information from.”

Constand went over each of her visits with Cosby: He invited her to New York City to meet with a friend of his who could help her break into broadcasting. Another time he invited her to New York City for a jazz concert, where he told her she would meet some other young women with the same interests as her (she saw him just briefly there). She went to his home, again, for another dinner to talk about her broadcasting career.

It was at that dinner, she said, that Cosby sat near Constand and, while they talked, reached over and tried to unbutton her her pants. She leaned forward and “gestured that I wasn’t interested, that I was not here for that and he complied respectfully. And nothing was ever said about it ever again.”

Next came the trip of the Foxwoods Resort Casino, where she said Cosby suddenly laid down next to her on a bed. Constand had no idea why Cosby did that, she said, and a few minutes afterward she left. Answering questions from Feden, Constand explained why she met with Cosby even after his advances. He was a powerful man, especially at Temple, widely respected, and was offering her career help.

“I think it was a bit absurd given that he was just a little bit younger than my grandfather,” she said. “He was a married man, and I had absolutely no interest in him whatsoever for him to do that. But I wasn’t threatened, and I didn’t judge him.”

She later added: “I had no questions about my ability to fend off a person who was hitting on me or making a sexual advance on me.”

Constant’s last meeting with Cosby was another trip to his house to tell him she had decided to leave Temple to pursue a career in massage therapy, like her father. It was that night, she said, Cosby gave her three blue pills and said, in her recollection, “these are your friends, they’ll help take the edge off.” She took them, she said, because she trusted him. Soon, Constand said she felt woozy and her mouth turned dry, like cotton, and she needed to lay down. She started to panic.

This is what Constand said she remembers next: “I was kind of jolted awake, and felt Mr. Cosby on the couch beside me, behind me. And my vagina was being penetrated quite forcefully… I felt my breast being touched, and he took my hand and placed my hand on his penis and masturabed himself with my hand. And I was not able to do anything about that.”

Constand couldn’t do anything, her limbs wouldn’t move. There was no way to fight him off, she testified.

“I was really humiliated,” Constand said, asked about how she felt about what happened. “I was in shock, and I was really confused.”

Constand testified she woke up to Cosby offering her breakfast. She grabbed a little tea and the top of a muffin and left. She drove home, thinking, “What just happened? Why did he do this to me?” She went home, took a shower, and went to work.

Constand eventually left Temple and went back to Canada, where she had nightmares. She did go see a Cosby performance there because her parents really wanted to see the show and “I just didn’t have the courage to tell them. So that was a bit of a burden to me.”

About a year later, as Constand was taking classes on consent as part of her massage training, Constand said she woke up one day after having a really bad nightmare. So she finally told her mother.

“ I didn’t want it to happen to anyone else, what happened to me,” Constand said. “I was scared.”

Constand later added, when asked what she had feared: “I was scared about either him going to the media or saying bad things about my family or saying what I was saying is not true. I was very concerned. I didn’t know who to turn to.”

After that night with Cosby, Constand said, she was never the same. But she did reach out to local law enforcement. “My life was changed from the day I reported this to the police,” she said.

When Constand told her mother, Gianna, she had insisted on calling Cosby herself. In the phone call, Andrea Constand said Cosby apologized to her, saying “I’m sorry.” Afterward, Cosby’s representatives started reaching out. One was a call from Ken DiCamillo, who was calling for Andrea on behalf of Peter Weiderlight at William Morris. The call was recorded.

On the line, DiCamillo’s voice was cheery and chipper. He said “great” a lot while taking about booking a flight for Constand and her mother from Canada down to Miami to talk to Cosby. “The sooner the better would be great,” DiCamillo said. DiCamillo pushed Andrea several times to just give him her contact info so he could start setting up this meeting in Miami. Constand pushed back, saying she has to call her mother first. She eventually got off the phone without giving him he information and never called him back.

The next message played for jurors was from the well-known Hollywood pitfall lawyer Marty Singer. In this, Singer was calm: “Hi, my name is Marty Singer. I work with Bill Cosby. I work with him and and I handle, his, uh trust and educational funds for him.”

When asked if she was expecting that call from Singer, Constand answered, “No.”

The trial is currently for lunch. Constand will continue to testify and possibly face cross examination later on this afternoon.