The comedian rapist decision has no legal precedent in a federal case, but it does show what can happen when someone is assured by the authorities they won’t be prosecuted for something but then are.

It is a similar situation to what the madam/procurer is facing now.

Bill Cosby

Ghislaine Maxwell

Bill Cosby is a free man after Pennsylvania Supreme Court overturns sex assault conviction

(CNN)Bill Cosby was released from prison Wednesday after Pennsylvania’s highest court overturned his sexual assault conviction, saying the disgraced actor’s due process rights were violated.
The stunning decision in the case of the man once known as “America’s Dad” reverses the first high-profile celebrity criminal trial of the #MeToo era.
The panel of Pennsylvania State Supreme Court judges said in their opinion that a former Montgomery County district attorney’s decision to not prosecute Cosby in 2005 in return for his deposition in a civil case was ultimately used against him at trial.

“In light of these circumstances, the subsequent decision by successor D.A.s to prosecute Cosby violated Cosby’s due process rights,” the judges wrote.

Cosby was sentenced in 2018 to 3 to 10 years in a state prison for drugging and sexually assaulting Andrea Constand at his home in 2004. – Source

Bill Cosby is free; Ghislaine Maxwell should be, too

The Pennsylvania Supreme Court did the right thing when it threw out Bill Cosby’s convictions because prosecutors cheated: They promised Cosby that they would not prosecute him if he would testify in the civil cases against him; based on that promise, Cosby testified and did not invoke his Fifth Amendment right to remain silent. Prosecutors then broke their promise and used Cosby’s statements in those depositions to win a conviction against him.

The state Supreme Court not only acquitted him but barred the prosecutors from retrying him.

The court framed the issue as whether the prosecutor’s “decision not to prosecute Cosby in exchange for his testimony must be enforced against the Commonwealth.” That seems pretty straightforward, right? Even prosecutors should have to live up to their end of a bargain. If a prosecutor promises something, he should be bound by his word — just like the rest of us.

And for 79 pages, the court detailed why prosecutors are no different than any other actor in the justice system. When they make a promise, they have to stick to it.

This opinion and reasoning applies directly to Ghislaine Maxwell’s case.

In her case, Jeffrey Epstein pleaded guilty and struck a bargain with the prosecutors in Miami: In exchange for pleading guilty in state court, the U.S. attorney’s office agreed that it would not prosecute any of his alleged co-conspirators.

There has been quite a bit of criticism of this deal. But it is a contract that Epstein and the government entered into knowingly and voluntarily. And certainly, the government was in the better bargaining position as it is with any criminal defendant.

Maxwell is accused of being one of Epstein’s co-conspirators from 25 years ago. She has declared her innocence and is set to fight the case at trial in November. But she should not have to fight her case at trial and her case should be thrown out, just like Cosby’s has been, because prosecutors promised Epstein when he pleaded guilty that they would not prosecute her. – Source


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