A Los Angeles County jury has found Bill Cosby liable for a 1972 sexual assault, awarding Donna Motsinger a total of $59.25 million in damages.
According to Deadline, The verdict includes $19.25 million in compensatory damages — $17.5 million for past emotional distress and $1.75 million for future suffering — along with an additional $40 million in punitive damages. Jurors determined Cosby acted with “malice, oppression, or fraud,” leading to the significant increase in the final award.
Motsinger, now 84, filed the lawsuit in 2023 under California’s temporary lookback law, which allowed older sexual assault claims to move forward. She alleged that Cosby drugged and raped her after inviting her to a comedy show in the Bay Area while she was working as a server at a Sausalito restaurant.
According to her testimony, Cosby offered her wine before the show, after which she began feeling ill and lost consciousness. She later woke up at home partially unclothed.
Cosby, 88, denied the allegations and did not testify during the two-week trial. His attorney, Jennifer Bonjean, confirmed that an appeal is already underway, stating that the case represents “a profound failure of the legal system” and arguing that decades-old claims make it difficult to mount a fair defense.
This case marks another major civil judgment against Cosby, who has faced numerous allegations of sexual misconduct over the years. In 2022, a Los Angeles jury awarded $500,000 to Judy Huth, who accused him of assaulting her as a teenager in 1975.
Cosby was also convicted in 2018 in Pennsylvania for the sexual assault of Andrea Constand, though that conviction was overturned in 2021 on procedural grounds after he served nearly three years in prison.
With an appeal already in motion — and ongoing questions about Cosby’s financial state — it remains unclear whether Motsinger will ultimately receive the full amount awarded.