Bill Cosby’s legal team seeks to have sexual assault charges dismissed

Bill Cosby‘s legal team has filed a motion to get sexual assault charges against the disgraced actor dismissed.

Cosby’s defense team filed a motion in Pennsylvania Thursday to have the sexual assault case, filed by Andrea Constand of Toronto, dismissed due to a lack of evidence. The former Cosby Show star is due in court for a retrial in April.

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Cosby was accused of drugging and raping Constand at his home near Philadelphia at some point between late December 2003 and early January 2004. He previously said that the encounter was consensual.

He was charged with aggravated indecent assault on Dec. 30, 2015, barely meeting the statute of limitations of 12 years.

Cosby’s defence is that he was not in Pennsylvania during Constand’s alleged time frame, and her phone records don’t line up with calls she allegedly made to him during that period.

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“Ms. Constand’s fabrications have boxed her, and by extension the commonwealth, into a corner,” the defence team said. “Her inconsistent and contradictory statements are not supported by the only objective proof in this case: the records.”

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Cosby’s lawyers are also accusing prosecutors of withholding and destroying evidence that could have helped him. They say in court papers that prosecutors only recently informed them of an interview last year with a woman who cast doubts on Andrea Constand’s allegations. They also say detectives destroyed their notes from the interview.

The woman, Marguerite Jackson, says Constand told her of a plan to falsely accuse a “high-profile person” so she could sue and get money. At Cosby’s first trial, the judge blocked Jackson’s testimony. Jurors were deadlocked at that trial.

Constand’s lawyer says Jackson is lying.

Cosby’s retrial is scheduled for April 2, with jury selection set to start on March 29.

— With files from The Associated Press