On Thursday afternoon, Judge Steven O’Neill sentenced the disgraced entertainer to three to ten years in prison for sexually assaulting Andrea Constand in 2004. State attorneys had requested the maximum sentence for Cosby, which would have sent him to prison for at least 5 years. “I’m not permitted to treat him any differently based on who he is or who he was,” O’Neill reportedly said.
Earlier on Tuesday, O’Neill also classified Cosby as a “sexually violent predator.” Being an SVP “requires lifetime registration, lifetime mandatory sex offender counseling with a treatment provider and notification of the community that a ‘sexually violent predator’ lives in the area,” CNN reported.
Constand is one of 60 women who have accused Cosby of sexual misconduct. “When the sexual assault happened, I was a young woman brimming with confidence and looking forward to a future bright with possibilities. Now, almost 15 years later, I’m a middle-aged woman who’s been stuck in a holding pattern for most of her adult life, unable to heal fully or to move forward,” Constand wrote in a victim impact statement.