Roland Martin talks to Bill Cosby's lawer Monique Pressley

Roland Martin talks to Bill Cosby‘s lawyer Monique Pressley about the allegations against the famed comedian/actor in where over 30 women are alleging that Cosby sexually assaulted them.

So where does the case stands now?

Read the transcript of the interview below:

ROLAND MARTIN:  Tom, it’s been a crazy last couple of weeks.  Ever since the deposition of Bill Cosby from 2005 leaked more and more folks have just run away from him, of course.  The documentary on Stunt Men, they pulled him out of that.  Now over the weekend we’ve got the news of Spellman ending their professorship with his name on it.  Joining us this morning is Monique Pressley who is a member of the Bill Cosby legal team.  Monique, welcome to the Tom Joyner Morning Show.

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Good morning, everyone.

ROLAND MARTIN:  So much has changed.  First off in that deposition a lot of people, after that came out it said Bill Cosby confessed and admitted to drugging and raping women.  And you have been on various media outlets saying that was not the case.

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Exactly.  That was not a part of his testimony in that deposition.  That instead was part of the headline the media used to report on excerpts from the deposition that just did not at all coincide with what he actually say.

TOM JOYNER:  Well, what did he say?

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Well, in the deposition he was asked questions about having in his possession the then legal substance, which was Quaaludes, which as some of you who are listening now may know was a very popular party drugs during the ‘70s, about 40 plus years ago and it was something that was not an illegal substance, something that he testified that he got through a prescription from a doctor that he knew at the time.  And his testimony was that he had it available and that he offered it to one woman in particularly who consensually took the substance which is very different than the accusations that are out there that he was slipping it into womens’ drinks without their knowledge and without their consent and then that it was “powerful sedative that rendered them semi-unconscious.”  That was not his testimony.  And that’s not what was actually said in the deposition.  But some, what he did say, the headlines we got were Bill Cosby admits to drugging women with that same drug, et cetera.

ROLAND MARTIN:  This has been obviously driven by more than 30 women who have said that Bill Cosby had drugged and raped them.  New York Magazine, they had this huge story with all of the women assembled there as well.  His detractors say point blank; you can’t have this many women accuse him of drugging him and raping him and it not be true.

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Well, and that’s something also that isn’t true.  I think that one of the things that is a popular ploy for some of the plaintiff’s attorneys is to say that 30 women are accusing Bill Cosby of rape, and they aren’t.  So the vast majority of them have accusations that are something like using a drugging substance or not touching them appropriately or attempting sexual assault.  There’s a smaller subset in there that most of those accusations date many decades ago, or accusing him of actual physical assault.  So what happens is that people look at it and think by the sheer volume, or the number of people that are saying it, that certainly it has to be true.  And one of the things that I pointed out repeatedly is that many times people see an opening, a way that they can use the story that now has no way of being proven true or false.  People are saying things happened 30 years ago, 40 years ago, any potential witness or any person that could be brought forward to prove it true or false is long gone or dead.  They’re not even using exact dates.  Things are being said like, ‘this happened sometime in 1974 on some tour’.  So what would normally happen here is that it would be brought timely and then in a court of law you would have an opportunity to defend against the accusation and the person bringing the accusation would actually have to prove it.  But when it’s beyond the statute of limitations, and when media has an appetite for it, any person can wake up this morning and then choose to say that something happened and have a picture that they took with Bill Cosby at a comedy show, or on a tour, and use that as proof, ‘here, I was with him on that date.’  And some of these cases, in most of them, the only proof that they’re offering is proof that they were actually in his company.

TOM JOYNER:  You know, Monique, Monique Pressley, I’ve never heard of you before, before this, except being on Roland’s show, just listening to you, just now, I think Bill Cosby has chosen a very good attorney because you broke that down.

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Well, thank you for that.

TOM JOYNER:  How did he get in touch with you?  How did he know about you?

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Well, now we’re going to have to you credit for that, Mr. Joyner.

TOM JOYNER:  What?

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Even though you were not actually on the radio that day someone who is a loyal supporter of Mr. Cosby called and said that there is an attorney who’s been speaking regarding your cases and is saying things that make a lot of sense.  And then, as they say, the rest is history, so thank you Roland Martin, and thank you, Tom Joyner Morning Show.

SYBIL WILKES:  So where do you go from here, Monique Pressley, in terms of, I understand last, or was it a couple of weeks ago where an injunction was filed against the young women from Temple, Andrea Constand.  So where do you go from here regarding that case and the others?

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Well, that case still is still under a confidentiality agreement, so I can’t talk about what the next steps would be except to point people to the things that we’re filing.  We’ve moved for injunctive relief, one, because one of the things that her attorneys were asking the courts to do was unseal Mr. Cosby’s over 1,000 page deposition, and as we all know now through other means that deposition is in the open, it’s out there for a number of outlets to peer and to put out excerpts as they choose to do so.  So we asked the court to kind of cancel out that motion and then we’re going to a magistrate judge for other relief because we do believe that the confidentiality agreement has been violated.  But I can’t discuss the release that we’re hoping for because we’re still bound and have to honor the agreement that we made.

TOM JOYNER:  Wow.

ROLAND MARTIN:  Attorney Monique Pressley for Bill Cosby, we appreciate you joining us on the Tom Joyner Morning Show, thanks a lot.

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  Thank you for having me.

TOM JOYNER:  Okay.  What, 30 days, Gloria Allred, it says she wants you all to do a deposition, Monique?

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  That’s what she says.  We’ll see what happens, Tom.

SYBIL WILKES:  So you don’t sound like it’s going to be within 30 days.

MONIQUE PRESSLEY:  (Laugh)

TOM JOYNER:  That’s what she says; ‘we’ll see what happens, Tom.’  Gloria Allred wants the deposition in 30 days.

SYBIL WILKES:  It doesn’t sound Mr. Cosby’s going to be the one being grilled like a hamburger.

TOM JOYNER:  (Laugh)

ROLAND MARTIN:  Gloria, all of them, Monique Pressley.  That will be interesting.

SYBIL WILKES:  Yeah, man.

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(Photo Source: Monique Pressley /New York Magazine Twitter)