Janice Dickinson Joins Alleged Victims Demanding Bill Cosby Confess

Earlier this week, Janice Dickinson joined a growing list of women, including former Law & Order: SVU actress Michelle Hurd, accusing comedian Bill Cosby of rape.

It may be tempting for longtime Bill Cosby fans to dismiss Dickinson’s accusations. Dickinson has had a storied and controversial career in the public eye including a very public scandal involving Sylvester Stallone in 1994. However, as more details emerge about Dickinson’s alleged assail,t and the alleged assaults of other women who have accused Bill Cosby of rape, the account seems more credible.

In an op-ed with Entertainment Tonight, Dickinson described the assault and the effect it had on her life.

“The next morning I woke up, and I wasn’t wearing my pajamas, and I remember before I passed out that I had been sexually assaulted by this man… before I woke up in the morning, the last thing I remember was Bill Cosby in a patchwork robe, dropping his robe and getting on top of me. And I remember a lot of pain. The next morning I remember waking up with my pajamas off and there was semen in between my legs.”

Dickinson continues the op-ed by noting that she took pictures of Cosby in the robe before the assault. The pictures, which Dickinson says she took after she was drugged, but before she passed out, were released earlier this week by celebrity gossip website, TMZ. The photographs show Cosby on the phone, wearing the patchwork robe Dickinson described. Cosby appears to be shirtless underneath the robe, and his legs are visible, though it isn’t clear if he is naked or merely wearing shorts.

In an exclusive with In Touch Weekly, Pablo Fenjves said Janice Dickinson told him about the alleged assault when he wrote her biography in 2002.

“Janice told me this story years ago, when I was helping her with her first book, ‘No Lifeguard on Duty.’ She told me that Bill Cosby had invited her to Tahoe to talk to her about her career, but he had other plans.”

Fenjves described Janice Dickinson as visibly shaken when she recounted the assault, even though it had occurred nearly two decades before. When asked why the rape was not recounted in Dickinson’s biography, Fenjves said that he knew lawyers for the publishing company, HarperCollins, would never take the risk on printing Janice Dickinson’s allegations against Cosby. “[I told her] it’ll be your word against his. It doesn’t matter that every word is true. He’s a powerful man, and he’ll do whatever it takes to protect himself.'”

Now Dickinson expresses regret, specifically about not coming forward sooner.

“Now I see that my silence, even though logical in a distorted way, permitted him to continue to do this to other women. Maybe if I had been really vocal, it would have saved many women. (Sisters, this is a really good reason to report sexual assault, even if it is very painful and scary for each of us.)”