Claims of racism, sexism in Bill Cosby trial

Andrew Wyatt was never far from Bill Cosby's side in public during his trial and sentencing. Photo / AP

A colourful dissent against the #MeToo movement was mounted on Wednesday outside the courtroom in Norristown, Pennsylvania, where Bill Cosby, a once cherished American father figure, was sentenced to three to 10 years in prison for drugging and sexual assaulting a woman in his home in 2004.

A conclusion that many celebrated as justice for a man who had long eluded accusations of misconduct was described by Cosby's publicist, Andrew Wyatt, as the latest offensive in a "sex war" gripping the country. He likened the proceedings against Cosby, 81, to the persecution of Jesus.

"They persecuted Jesus, and looked what happened," Wyatt said. "Not saying Mr Cosby is Jesus, but we know what the country has done to black men for centuries."

The spokesman delivered a broadside against Judge Steven O'Neill that seemed designed for maximum shock value, pitting white women against black men amid a vexed national reckoning with issues of race and gender. Wyatt also invoked the battle over Judge Brett Kavanaugh's nomination to the Supreme Court, unfolding in Washington.

"What is going on in Washington today with Judge Kavanaugh is part of that sex war that Judge O'Neill, along with his wife, are part of," said Wyatt, the founder of Purpose PR, based in Birmingham, Alabama. Lawyers for Cosby had asked the judge to recuse himself because his wife, Deborah O'Neill, is a therapist who works with victims of sexual assault.

Wyatt observed that generations of African Americans have looked up to Cosby, who once enjoyed a net worth of US$400 million ($601m). His on-screen portrayal of a successful doctor was a symbol of what minorities in America could achieve, and his off-screen philanthropy provided them with the educational tools to do so.

"Dr Cosby has been one of the greatest civil rights leaders in the United States for over the last 50 years," Wyatt said. "He has also been one of the greatest educators of men and boys over the last 50 years." During that same period, according to the accounts of 60 women, Cosby was repeatedly acting out as a sexual predator.

The only case that produced criminal charges was that of Andrea Constand, a former Temple University employee whom Cosby had mentored in the early 2000s. He was convicted in April of aggravated indecent assault.

Wyatt described the proceedings as "the most racist and sexist trial in the history of the United States". He may have overlooked, to name just two examples, the 1955 acquittal of two white men in the beating, torture and murder of Emmett Till and, further back, the 19th-century trial that led to the Dred Scott case, in which the Supreme Court concluded that black people could never be American citizens.

After Cosby's conviction in April, His wife, Camille Cosby, compared him to Till, the 14-year-old lynched for allegedly flirting with a white woman.

The charged gender dynamics of anti-black prejudice were leveraged on Wednesday by Wyatt, who argued that white women had sealed Cosby's fate. "All three of the psychologists who testified against Dr Cosby were white women who make money off of accusing black men of being sexual predators," Wyatt told reporters outside the courtroom.

Wyatt said the judge had "conspired with bad psychologists".

Wyatt and another publicist, Ebonee Benson, also accused prosecutors of relying on falsified evidence, including an audio recording of a 2005 conversation between the defendant and the victim's mother that they argue was edited to remove exonerating information.

Cosby's lawyers have said they will appeal.