The Slatest

Bill Cosby Lawsuit Says Latest Underage Sexual Assault Claim Is Extortion Attempt

Bill Cosby at the Jackie Robinson Foundation annual Awards Dinner in 2009.

Photo by Stan Honda/AFP/Getty Images

Bill Cosby has been largely silent over the past several weeks as the sexual assault allegations against the comedian continued to pile up. While Cosby, through his lawyer, has generally dismissed the claims as false through his lawyer Marty Singer, on Thursday Cosby’s legal team pushed back on the recent accusation leveled by Judy Huth. In a court filing this week, Huth said she was sexually abused by Cosby at the Playboy Mansion in 1974, when she was only 15 years old.

Cosby attorney Marty Singer accused Huth of extortion in a court filing on Thursday. “Cosby says Huth’s lawyer approached the comedian’s attorney, Marty Singer, last month and made ‘ominous references’ to ‘criminal penalties.’ ” ABC News reports. “According to the lawsuit, Huth’s lawyer demanded $100,000 for her silence, and later increased the amount to $250,000 as additional women came forward.”

Judy Huth is the first woman to file a lawsuit against the comedian in the latest round of accusations. The nearly two dozen other claims against Cosby are decades-old and have exceeded the statute of limitations for the alleged crimes. Huth, however, who was underage at the time, “used a portion of California law that allows for a lawsuit to be filed three years after a child sex crime is discovered to have caused damages,” according to Reuters.

While Cosby has so far avoided any legal repercussions for the alleged assaults, his silence on the mounting allegations has decimated his public image. Upcoming projects with NBC and Netflix have been canceled, Cosby has resigned from the board of Temple University, and on Thursday, the Navy revoked an honorary title from Cosby as a consequence of the allegations. Cosby served four years in the Navy and in 2011, was given the title of honorary Chief Petty Officer.