Cosby lawyers want Pittsburgh-area defamation suit dismissed

What do you think of Bill’s latest claims, Perezcious readers?

Comedian Bill Cosby is suing Beverly Johnson, saying the model defamed him by accusing him of sexual assault in his home.

However, Cosby is now fighting back – on Monday (21Dec15), his lawyers filed a lawsuit in the Superior Court of California in Los Angeles, dismissing Johnson’s account as “false, malicious, opportunistic, and defamatory”.

Cosby is seeking both compensatory and punitive damages, as well as a public apology and the removal of the chapter in question from her autobiography from all unsold copies of the book.

Attorney Monique Pressley, who is representing Cosby in a barrage of legal claims related to accusations he drugged and sexually assaulted scores of women over four decades, said in a press release that Cosby’s latest lawsuit states “that he never drugged defendant and her story is a lie”.

But when McKee entered Cosby’s room, he “snatched the ribs from her hands and tossed them aside” and then “proceeded to forcibly rape” her, according to the complaint. No criminal charges have been filed against Cosby.

Since 2014, Cosby, 78, has been accused of drugging and/or sexual misconduct by more than 50 women. Johnson’s allegations did not involve sexual assault, but the actress claims Cosby spiked her drink with an unknown drug during a meeting at his Manhattan residence in the 1980s.

Cosby’s response comes in the wake of counterclaims his attorneys filed last week in a MA federal court against seven women who are suing him there for defamation. His attorneys have made numerous denials of wrongdoing and Cosby has never been charged with a crime.

Johnson later talked about the alleged incident to other publications and television shows such as “The View“, “Nightline” and “Good Morning America“.

Johnson – famous for being the first black woman to appear on the cover of AmericanVogue in 1974 – alleges that Cosby drugged her cappuccino in the mid-1980s, but that she was able to stave him off, partly by repeatedly calling him a “motherfucker”.

The wave of allegations against Cosby have scuttled the comedian’s acting projects and live shows in the past year.