Tom Werner, Cosby Show Producer, Defends Bill’s ‘Legacy’ As Cosby Lawyer Attacks Rape & Drugs ‘Witch Hunt’ [Video]

Tom Werner, producer of Bill Cosby’s show, has broken his silence. And Tom urges that the public and media honor the legacy from the fictional Huxtable family featured on the show that Werner produced rather than on the allegations of sexual assault and drugging that Cosby faces, reported MSN.

Although Tom was at the TV Critics Association press tour to hype his Survivor’s Remorse series, Werner took time to reflect on The Cosby Show.

As for the women who have stepped forward to accuse Cosby of drugging them and then sexually assaulting them?

“I don’t really want to comment on it,” Tom stated firmly.

https://youtu.be/H1BRdaKzp7c

What Werner did want to address, however, is The Cosby Show’s impact on families and the world of television.

“The legacy of the show is obviously very important to me, because the show was a groundbreaking show and it portrayed a middle-class African American family in a very positive way. It had a lot of stories that resonated with families because people watched it together. Obviously it’s a challenging time for Bill Cosby and a challenging time for the show, but I’m hoping that people will still be able to watch the show and identify with the Huxtables.”

Tom previously teamed up with his partner Marcy Carsey to address their experience on The Cosby Show and Cosby, both of which they helmed from their Carsey-Werner company.

https://youtu.be/aNxiqCV5b9Q

“The Bill [Cosby] we know was a brilliant and wonderful collaborator on a show that changed the landscape of television,” said Tom and Marcy. “These recent news reports are beyond our knowledge or comprehension.”

Despite Werner’s attempt to put the focus on Cosby’s show rather than the sexual assault accusations, repeats have been pulled by TV Land, BET Centric, and Bounce TV.

With 46 women accusing Cosby of drugging and sexually assaulting them, Bill’s attorney is responding by describing the situation as a witch hunt. Moreover, Monique Pressley has developed a legal defense that accuses those women of failing to report the alleged rapes in a timely manner, reported Gothamist.

“I’m not speculating, I’m not thinking, I’m not opining, I’m not waxing poetic, but what I’m saying is women have responsibility,” said Pressley.

Monique questioned whether the women were speaking the truth, then added that if they are, the only way that any of them could have received justice was to immediately report their rape accusations.

“We have responsibility for our bodies, we have responsibility for our decisions, we have responsibility for the way we conduct ourselves.The only way for a woman to get the justice that she seeks — and that, if her allegation is true, that she deserves — is to come forward [soon after the crime].”

Therefore, concludes Cosby’s attorney, because the sexual assault and drugging accusations are surfacing now, the lack of current cases makes the situation into a modern-day witch hunt.

“And even if the reasons that the women did not do that are legitimate ones, what cannot happen — in my opinion, in the United States — is that 40 years later there is a persecution tantamount to a witch hunt where there was no prosecution timely and there was no civil suit timely. And there’s not any testimony or any accusation from any of these women that Mr. Cosby in any way bound them, gagged them, prevented them from coming forward and saying whatever their truth was at the time. That’s not what happened,” added the attorney.

As the Inquisitr reported, attorney Gloria Allred recently announced two new detailed cases of women stating that they were drugged and then sexually assaulted by Cosby.

Both Lili Bernard, an actress who guest-starred on the Cosby Show, and writer Sammie Mays offered detailed accounts of having Cosby give them drugs prior to raping them.

[Photo By Brendan Smialowski/Getty Images for Meet The Press]