Deposition: Cosby paid women to keep affairs secret

NEW YORK (AP) — Bill Cosby, in sworn testimony a decade ago, said he had paid women after sex to keep the affairs from his wife, suggested he was skilled at understanding nonverbal cues for sexual consent and called one of his accusers a liar.

The New York Times reported the revelations Saturday after obtaining a copy of a transcript from a deposition Cosby gave in a lawsuit filed by a former Temple University employee who alleges he drugged and molested her.

According to excerpts from the deposition released a month ago, and first obtained by The Associated Press, Cosby admitted he procured quaaludes with the intent of giving them to young women he wanted to have sex with.

The Times, citing the transcript, reports that Cosby told lawyers for Andrea Constand, who worked at Temple in Philadelphia and brought the suit, that he was a “pretty decent reader of people and their emotions in these romantic sexual things.”

He said he offered to pay for Constand’s education and paid another woman whom he had met in 1976. He said he funneled money to one of the women he had sex with through his agent so his wife wouldn’t find out.

Cosby’s publicist, David Brokaw, did not immediately return a message seeking comment late Saturday.

Although Constand never sought any money from Cosby, the comedian said he figured his wife would have known he was helping her with furthering her education but said, “My wife would not know it was because Andrea and I had had sex,” according to the newspaper.

Constand’s case was settled on confidential terms.

Cosby has denied accusations made by dozens of women who claim he sexually assaulted them. He has never been charged with a crime, but the accusations have shattered Cosby’s good-guy, fatherly image.

At points during the deposition, Cosby also described his sexual encounters with the women in detail.

The deposition also paints Cosby as emotionally charming, but he also spoke about disregarding relationships to pursue other women.

He suggested he was skilled at understanding women and nonverbal cues signaling sexual consent.

Cosby, who has been married since 1964, said he sparked a relationship with Constand in the early 2000s and invited her to his house and had conversations about her family and plans for future education.

The relationship between the two continued for several years until, Constand says, Cosby drugged and molested her in his Pennsylvania home.

Cosby said during the deposition that Constand was “a liar.”

Although Cosby painted himself as sensitive to Constand, he told her attorney, “I think Andrea is a liar and I know she’s a liar because I was there,” when he was asked how he felt about Constand crying during her deposition in the case.

Bruce Castor, the suburban Pennsylvania prosecutor who declined to bring charges in the Constand case a decade ago, told the AP earlier this month that if he is elected again he would review the unsealed court documents to see if Cosby committed perjury.

The Associated Press generally does not name people who say they have been sexually assaulted unless they agree to have their names published, as Constand has done.