The recent Pennsylvania Supreme Court ruling overturning Bill Cosby’s conviction and ordering his immediate release, without possibility of retrial, is disappointing, to say the least. Former US Attorney Barbara McQuade does an excellent job explaining the legal basis for the decision. It was not a repudiation of MeToo (which Cosby’s lawyers called a period of “public panic”) or a conclusion that there was insufficient evidence that Cosby raped multiple women.
Instead, it was due to the poor choices of prosecutor Bruce Castor, both in not prosecuting Cosby when the assaults first came to light and in releasing a statement at the time that there was insufficient evidence to bring charges.Castor claims that he released the statement so that Cosby would cooperate in the civil suit, providing some relief to victim Andrea Constand.
His words upon the release of Cosby, though, are telling. He said that the PA Supreme Court ruling “exonerated” his actions in 2005, and was a “shellacking” of the succeeding district attorney’s decision to charge Cosby. “I was right back in 2005 and I’m right in 2021. I’m proud of our Supreme Court for having the courage to make an unpopular decision.”
Strange, no? To be so gleeful about an opinion that releases a convicted sex offender due to his own errors? To me, this is a failure of the system to ensure that prosecutors answer to the public and especially, to the crime’s victims. If Castor felt more responsibility to Cosby’s victims, would he be so sanguine now? Would he have made those missteps in the first place?
Sadly, the PA SCT also recently threw out a state constitutional amendment, passed by voters on a wide margin, that gave victims rights under the PA state constitution. The Republican-controlled PA Senate also recently voted out long-time PA Victim Advocate Jennifer Storm, in an action she termed a “political witch hunt.”
You have some work to do, Pennsylvania. Your people deserve better. We all do.