‘I was frozen’, Bill Cosby accuser tells sex assault trial

Bill Cosby’s chief accuser took the stand at his sexual assault trial to tell her story publicly for the first time, saying the comedian gave her pills that left her paralysed and helpless, before groping her.

“In my head, I was trying to get my hands to move or my legs to move, but I was frozen,” Andrea Constand, a former basketball manager at Temple University, Cosby’s alma mater, said in their long-awaited courtroom confrontation.

She added: “I wasn’t able to fight in any way. I wanted it to stop.”

Cosby, 79, is charged with drugging and violating Ms Constand at his suburban Philadelphia home in 2004. The TV star once dubbed America’s Dad could get 10 years in prison if convicted.

Ms Constand, 44, said Cosby assaulted her after giving her three blue pills he claimed were a natural remedy to ease her stress about a looming career change. She said she started feeling woozy after about 20 minutes, with blurred vision and slurred words, before he abused her.

Afterwards, she said, “I felt really humiliated and I felt really confused”.

Cosby stared down at the defence table, resting a hand across his forehead, as Ms Constand testified.

Before Tuesday, Ms Constand had never spoken about Cosby in public, barred from doing so under the terms of a confidential settlement they reached in 2006. Her deposition from that lawsuit remains sealed.

Some 60 women have come forward to say Cosby sexually violated them, all but destroying his nice-guy image on screen and off, but the statute of limitations for prosecution had run out in nearly every case. Ms Constand’s case is the only one in which Cosby has been charged.

The stage was set for Tuesday’s confrontation after prosecutors used the first day and a half of the trial to argue that Cosby made a habit of knocking women out with pills and then molesting them.

Kelly Johnson testified on Monday that Cosby drugged and molested her at a Los Angeles hotel bungalow in 1996.

She said she lost consciousness soon after Cosby pressured her to take a large white pill. She said that when she awoke, Cosby was naked and abused her.

On Tuesday, Ms Johnson’s mother, Pattrice Sewell, bolstered her daughter’s story, telling jurors that Ms Johnson was distraught during a telephone call in 1996, fearing Cosby was trying to get her sacked from her job working for the comedian’s agent.

A few weeks later, Ms Sewell said, Ms Johnson disclosed that she had woken up next to Cosby in bed with her clothes askew.