A judge has ruled that Janice Dickinson’s defamation lawsuit against Bill Cosby can continue after months of maneuvering by the comedian’s legal team.
In 2014, Dickinson publicly claimed that the comedian raped her in a Lake Tahoe hotel in 1982. Now, according to The Hollywood Reporter, a jury will decide whether her allegations are credible and whether Cosby’s former lawyer Marty Singer defamed her by calling her a liar in response to her claims.
For Dickinson, who also revealed she’s battling breast cancer earlier this week, the Los Angeles Superior Court’s decision seems to have been a minor vindication.
In a news conference outside a Los Angeles courthouse after the ruling, Dickinson shouted “Victory!” as her attorney hoisted the model’s hand in the air…. “I will not go down.”
Singer is famous for sending threatening letters to adversaries on behalf of his clients, and he did so with journalists looking to cover Dickinson’s story. Judge Debre Katz Weintraub said, however, that the correspondence is “protected legal communications and cannot be used at trial.”
Elsewhere, Cosby is still facing two more defamation suits from seven women and Kristina Ruehli, respectively, as well as fighting a criminal charge stemming from an alleged sexual assault in 2004. Oh, and the National Museum of African American History and Culture is celebrating his career with a small exhibit soon, so there’s that.
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