Washington (dpa) – A Pennsylvania judge has scheduled the retrial of comedian Bill Cosby on sexual assault allegations for November 6,
prosecutors said Thursday.
The plans follow last month’s declaration of a mistrial by Judge Steven O’Neill in the case after the 12-person jury in Norristown,
Pennsylvania, outside Philadelphia, was unable to reach a unanimous decision.
Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, District Attorney Kevin Steele had immediately vowed to seek a new trial after the judge’s June 17 decision that further jury deliberations were pointless.
The 79-year-old Cosby was charged with three felony counts of aggravated indecent assault for allegedly drugging and sexually
assaulting accuser Andrea Constand at his home in 2004.
The five women and seven men on the jury spent more than 50 hours during six days of deliberation.
The two-week trial saw Cosby’s defence team call a lone witness to the stand. The prosecution brought 12 witnesses including Constand and another of Cosby’s accusers.
More than 50 women have come forward to publicly accuse Cosby of drugging and raping them, but the trial focused solely on accusations
from Constand, a former employee at Temple University in Philadelphia, Cosby’s alma mater.
She alleges that Cosby gave her pills and sexually assaulted her as she drifted in and out of consciousness.
The African-American actor started his career as a stand-up comic in the 1960s.
His biggest success was the television sitcom “The Cosby Show,” which ran from 1984-92, in which he played obstetrician Cliff Huxtable, the wise and loveable patriarch of a large, affluent black family.
