PHILADELPHIA (AP) — Actor Bill Cosby has been denied parole after refusing to participate in sex offender programs during his nearly three years in state prison in Pennsylvania.
The 83-year-old Cosby has long said he would serve the full 10-year sentence rather than acknowledge wrongdoing and take part in the programs.
Cosby spokesman Andrew Wyatt told the Associated Press that the decision was “appalling” and added that Cosby “vehemently proclaims his innocence.”
This is the first year he was eligible for parole under the three- to 10-year sentence handed down in 2018.
Cosby meanwhile hopes the state Supreme Court will reverse his conviction.
His lawyers say the judge erred in letting five other accusers testify and letting the jury hear his damaging testimony from a related lawsuit.
Cosby was currently serving time at SCI-Phoenix in Montgomery County, which a state prison near Collegeville, Pennsylvania.
He was found guilty of three counts of aggravated indecent assault in April 2018 for drugging and sexually assaulting former Temple University women's basketball employee Andrea Constand at his home in 2004.
