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Bill Cosby Loses Battle to Quash Deposition About Quaaludes

The testimony includes his admission he gave Quaaludes to women for sex in the 1970s.
Image: Bill Cosby
Bill Cosby arrives for a pretrial hearing in his sexual assault case at the Montgomery County Courthouse in Norristown, Pa., Tuesday, Sept. 6, 2016.Matt Rourke / AP

A deposition in which Bill Cosby talks about giving pills to women for sex can be used against him at his criminal sexual abuse trial, a judge ruled Monday.

The decision is a blow to Cosby, who has been fighting to stop a jury from hearing the testimony he gave in a civil suit more than a decade ago, and a victory for prosecutors, who are hoping to show a pattern of behavior by the comedian.

Cosby is charged with with drugging and molesting Andrea Constand at his Pennsylvania home in 2004 — the only criminal case stemming from dozens of claims of sexual misconduct that have surfaced in the last year and a half. He has denied any wrongdoing.

At the time of the incident, prosecutors declined to charge Cosby. Constand sued him and won a settlement — after he was deposed about their encounter and his encounters with other women.

In the 2005-2006 deposition, Cosby talks about giving Constand three and a half Benadryl pills during her visit and then getting physical with her.

"I don't hear her say anything. And I don't feel her say anything. And so I continue and go into the area that is somewhere permission and rejection. I am not stopped," he said at one point.

He also talked about giving Quaaludes to women in the 1970s.

"Quaaludes happen to be the drug that kids, young people were using to party with and there were times when I wanted to have them just in case," he said.

"When you got the Quaaludes, was it in your mind that you were going to use these Quaaludes for young women that you wanted to have sex with?" an attorney asked.

"Yes," Cosby replied.

Prosecutors are hoping to put on the stand up to 13 women who say they were drugged and then molested by Cosby over the decades. The judge has not yet ruled on whether the women can testify.