Bill Cosby, who was convicted in 2018 of drugging and sexually assaulting a woman, says he is a "political prisoner" like Martin Luther King Jr. and Nelson Mandela.
"My political beliefs, my actions of trying to humanize all races, genders and religions landed me in this place surrounded by barb wire fencing, a room made of steel and iron," Cosby said Wednesday in his first statement since his imprisonment four months ago. "So, I now have a temporary residence that resembles the quarters of some of the greatest political prisoners — Martin Luther King, Jr., Mahatma Gandhi, Nelson Mandela, Randal Robinson and Dr. Benjamin Chavis."
The written statement was released through his spokesman and crisis manager, Andrew Wyatt.
Cosby, 81, is serving a three- to 10-year sentence at SCI-Phoenix, a maximum-security state prison in suburban Philadelphia, for drugging and sexually assaulting Andrea Constand at his Montgomery County, Pennsylvania, home in 2004. He has been accused of sexual misconduct by dozens of women, but was criminally charged only in Constand’s case.
Wyatt told NBC News in an interview Wednesday that Cosby is in "amazing spirits" and "not remorseful."
“When I visit him, it’s nothing sad about it,” Wyatt said. "He will never have remorse, and the reason why he has no remorse is because he did nothing wrong. He was not guilty."
Wyatt also said that Cosby has not been moved from special housing to the general population at the Pennsylvania prison, as was stated last week by the state prison spokeswoman Amy Worden.
Instead, Wyatt said Cosby is in the veteran's facility with other "elderly inmates."
Cosby, who is legally blind, has inmates assigned to help him at times, given his age and disability, his spokesman and the prison spokeswoman have said.
Cosby, who was once known as "America's Dad," speaks with his wife, Camille, by phone three times a day, Wyatt said. He has not had any visits from his wife or daughters in the four months he has been at the prison.
Wyatt said he does not expect Cosby's wife or daughters to visit him at the prison, which is about 20 miles from a family estate.
"He does not want his family to be exploited that way by coming to visit him and it be made a circus out of by the media," Wyatt said. "So he has excluded them from coming to visit him for that reason and that reason alone."
Wyatt visits Cosby every other week and is his only visitor outside of his lawyers.
The disgraced comedian wakes up at 3:30 a.m. to do leg lifts, pushups and situps in his cell before breakfast, according to Wyatt, and he is developing show ideas from behind bars.
“He’s mentally strong,” Wyatt said. “He’s just a strong man.”
