A California civil jury on Monday, 23 March 2026, found comedian Bill Cosby liable for drugging and sexually assaulting former waitress Donna Motsinger in 1972, awarding her $19.25 million in damages after a nearly two-week trial that concluded in Santa Monica.
The panel, which deliberated for just over a day, awarded Motsinger $17.5 million for past mental suffering and $1.75 million for future damages covering emotional distress, grief, anxiety, and loss of enjoyment of life. In a separate finding, jurors determined that Cosby had acted with malice, oppression, or fraud, opening the door to additional punitive damages in a second phase of the trial scheduled to begin later on Monday.
Motsinger, now 84, alleged that Cosby befriended her while she was working as a server at The Trident restaurant in Sausalito, California, making regular visits over several days before inviting her to the recording of his stand-up comedy album at the Circle Star Theatre in nearby San Carlos. According to her civil lawsuit, filed in 2023, Cosby gave her wine in a limousine and two white pills she believed to be aspirin. She said she began losing consciousness and later woke up at home, partially undressed, believing she had been assaulted. Cosby did not testify at the trial.
Cosby, 88, denied the allegations. His attorneys argued that any encounter, if it occurred, was consensual, and described Motsinger’s claims as speculative given that she lacked a direct memory of the assault itself. His attorney, Jennifer Bonjean, said after the verdict that the decision would be appealed.
Speaking outside the Santa Monica courthouse, Motsinger called the verdict long overdue. “It has been 54 years to get justice,” she said, adding that she hoped the outcome would bring some comfort to other women who had made similar allegations.
The verdict is the latest in a series of civil judgments against the man once known as “America’s Dad” for his television work. In June 2022, a separate Santa Monica jury found Cosby liable for sexually abusing Judy Huth at the Playboy Mansion in 1975, when she was 16, and awarded her $500,000. Cosby also served nearly three years in prison following a 2018 criminal conviction in Pennsylvania for sexually assaulting Andrea Constand, though the conviction was overturned by the Pennsylvania Supreme Court on procedural grounds in 2021.
Motsinger’s lawsuit was made possible by a 2022 California law, signed by Governor Gavin Newsom, that temporarily suspended the statute of limitations for certain historical sexual assault claims.
