SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 22, 2014 Bill Cosby’s lawyer calls allegations ‘ridiculous’

ttorney for Bill Cosby slammed the numerous accusa- Huffington Post. Therese Serignese, a 58-year-old nurse from tions of sexual assault against his client, saying the five- Boca Raton, Fla., said she met Cosby 38 years ago when she Atime Emmy-winner has been the victim of a “media-dri- was 19. She says she was headlining a show at the Las Vegas ven feeding frenzy.” Hilton, where she met Cosby at the Hilton gift shop while look- “People are coming out the woodwork with fabricated or ing at jewelry with her sister. “Somebody came up to me and unsubstantiated stories about my client,” Martin Singer said in put their arm around my neck from the back and said: ‘Will you a lengthy statement. He also released the criminal records of marry me?’” Serignese told HuffPost. “And I turned around to one of Cosby’s alleged victims, Linda Joy Traitz, which includes see who it was, and it was Bill Cosby.” charges for criminal fraud and possession of several drugs, Serignese claims she was escorted to the greenroom after including cocaine, Oxycodone and marijuana. the show by one of Cosby’s people. Once she and Cosby were “This continued pattern of attacks has entered the realm of alone, he pulled out two white pills and a glass of water, telling the ridiculous,” he said. The statement came shortly after three her to “take these.” “The next memory I have, was, I was in a new accusers came forward on Thursday claiming that Cosby bathroom and I was kind of bending forward and he was assaulted them years ago, including Lou Ferrigno’s wife, a “One behind me having s.. with me,” she said. “I was just there, think- Flew Over the Cuckcoo’s Nest” actress and a nurse in Florida. ing ‘I’m on drugs, I’m drugged.’ I felt drugged and I was being 68-year-old Louisa Moritz, who played Rose in “One Flew raped and it was kind of surreal. My frame of mind was that it Over the Cuckoo’s Nest,” told TMZ late Thursday that Cosby would be over soon and I could just get out of there.” forced her to perform oral sex on him in 1971 before an After the incident, Serignese said she felt she could not go appearance on Johnny Carson’s “Tonight Show.” to the police because she blamed herself. “How did I let that According to Moritz, she was waiting for her appearance in happen?” she said. “You blame yourself. You now are a victim; the greenroom when Cosby knocked on her door. After he you’re embarrassed. Nobody would have believed any of us if implied “that he was going to see to it that [she] will become a we stood there back then in the ‘70s and said that [Bill Cosby major star through his direction,” she said he forced on her. had assaulted us].” Moritz, like other accusers, said she kept her story to herself until the recent accusers came up. Singer issued a statement Confided on Thursday specifically targeting Moritz accusations, attacking She did, however, confide in her mother, who encouraged her creditability. “We’ve reached a point of absurdity,” the her to call Cosby in hopes that he might take care of her. The statement reads. “The stories are getting more ridiculous. comedian put her up in a penthouse at the Hilton for three Now this woman is claiming that something occurred more weeks, but reportedly kicked her out after she feared she was than 40 years ago and that while she was waiting in the dress- pregnant. Serignese maintains that she continued contact with ing room to appear on the ‘Tonight Show,’ my client forced Cosby for years after, and reached out to him around 1985, into her. I think people are trying to come up with these wild after she had gone through a divorce. She says Cosby went to stories in order to justify why they have waited 40 to 50 years Michigan, where she lived at the time, and she called him to go to disclose these ridiculous accusations.” “The credibility of see his show. He apparently sent a limo to take her to the show, these stories is belied by the fact that Ms. Moritz claims that she and she said he “assumed” they were going to have sex. When is now a practicing lawyer, according to her official website and asked if he had given her drugs during this encounter, she said her iMDB page, but she is actually prohibited from practicing he intimidated her. law after she admitted violating the Rules of Professional “I would say he made me take drugs,” she said. “I really Conduct in her legal practice and was disciplined with public don’t think that I ever had consensual sex with him, ever. It was reproval by the State Bar to protect the public.” an intimidation thing; it was a vulnerability. I put myself in the wrong place many times and then I paid the consequences.” Forcefully After sustaining a car accident in 1996, she said she accept- Carla Ferrigno told Rumorfix that Cosby forcefully kissed ed two payments from Cosby, including a check for $5,000 Greer Grammer attends the press conference where she was her in 1967 when she was a teenager. “He attacked me,” she from his agent. But she did not come forward with the accusa- named Miss Golden Globe 2015.—AP said. “He grabbed me.” She said she told no one of the tions until she heard of Andrea Constand’s 2005 lawsuit, where encounter, but eventually confided in her husband five years the former director of operations for the Temple University ago. The other accuser to come forward on Thursday, a Florida women’s basketball team accused Cosby of drugging and Kelsey Grammer’s nurse, says the comedian raped her in 1976, according to the molesting her in 2004. —Reuters daughter is Miss Golden Globe elsey Grammer’s daughter Greer is the new Miss Golden Globe. Hollywood Foreign Press Association President Theo Kingma made Kthe announcement Thursday night at a party in her honor. It’s been a Golden Globe tradition for 50 years to have the daughter or son of a past winner help hand out statuettes during the ceremony. Kelsey Grammer has been nominated for nine Golden Globes and won three, Kingma said. Greer Grammer is an actress best known for playing Lissa in the MTV series “Awkward.” She also has a recurring role on the ABC Family show “Melissa & Joey.” Grammer had to leave the party at Los Angeles restaurant Fig & Olive early to film an episode of that show. Meanwhile, the 22-year-old actress said she’s “freaking out” about being named Miss Golden Globe and is already looking forward to her duties. First up is participating in the nominations announcement Dec. 11. “That’s so exciting to me,” she said. She’s also thinking about her dress for the ceremony. She said she’s been clipping photos since she learned of the honor last week. “It still doesn’t feel real,” Grammer said. Previous Miss Golden Globes have included Laura Dern, Melanie Griffith and “Fifty In this April 10, 2011 file photo, Bill Cosby, foreground, and the cast of “The Cosby Show,” Shades of Gray” star Dakota Johnson. from left, Keshia Knight Pulliam, Phylicia Rashad, Malcolm-Jamal Warner, Raven-Symoné and Grammer aims to follow in their footsteps with her own acting career. “I Sabrina Le Beauf accept the Impact Award at the 2011 TV Land Awards in New York. TV Land hope to be a Miss Golden Globe who gets to come back and win a Golden will stop airing reruns of “The Cosby Show,” after another woman came forward claiming that Globe,” she said. “That’s the end goal.” The Golden Globe Awards are set to the once-beloved comic had sexually assaulted her. Cosby has never been charged in connec- be presented Jan. 11. —AP tion with any of the allegations. —AP