Bill Cosby has dismissed reports suggesting he is embarking on a motivational speaking tour following the mistrial in his sexual assault case, even though the news came from his own publicist.
The embattled The Cosby Show star was allowed to walk free on 17 June (17) after the 12-person jury tasked with deliberating over three counts of aggravated indecent assault brought against him by Andrea Constand failed to reach a unanimous verdict.
Days later, his spokesman Andrew Wyatt claimed the veteran actor, who always insisted the sex he had with Constand at his Pennsylvania home back in 2004 was consensual, was plotting a speaking tour "sometime in July" to warn other men about the dangers of sexual assault allegations.
The news was met with heavy criticism and sparked a backlash online, and now Cosby has issued his own statement, insisting there were never plans for such a tour.
It reads: "The current propaganda that I am going to conduct a sexual assault tour is false (and) any further information about public plans will be given at the appropriate time."
The troubled comedian's remarks emerge shortly after his attorney Angela Agrusa poured doubt on the idea of Cosby addressing his legal woes in public.
She spoke to reporters after a Los Angeles Superior Court hearing on Tuesday (27Jun17), when Judge Craig Kaplan set 30 July, 2018 as a tentative date for the start of a sexual assault civil trial against the funnyman.
This case was filed by Judy Huth, one of more than 50 women who have come forward with decades-old accusations of inappropriate behaviour, drugging and/or rape against Cosby since late 2014. She filed a sexual assault lawsuit against the star in December, 2014, claiming she was just 15 when he reportedly touched her vagina and then forced himself upon her at a Playboy Mansion party in California in 1974.
The 79-year-old's lawyers twice requested to have the case dismissed, but the motions were rejected last year (16).
