Image:Playboy Magazine founder Hugh Hefner (R) and actor Bill Cosby arrive at a news conference at the Playboy Mansion in Los Angeles, California February 10, 2011. REUTERS/Fred Prouser/File Photo
By Steve Gorman
LOS ANGELES (Reuters) – Playboy founder Hugh Hefner has given a sworn deposition in a lawsuit brought by a woman who has accused comedian Bill Cosby of sexually abusing her as a minor at the Playboy Mansion, her lawyer said on Friday.
Hefner, 90, submitted to questioning under oath in a videotaped session on Wednesday at the famed Los Angeles mansion, where the creator of the adult entertainment empire still resides.
But due to a gag order issued by the judge in the case, lawyer Gloria Allred said she was not at liberty to discuss any details of the deposition, including the rationale for questioning him.
The deposition was ordered at Allred’s request in the lawsuit brought by Judy Huth, now in her 50s, alleging that Cosby plied her with alcohol and molested her in 1974 at the Playboy Mansion when she was 15.
A spokesman for Cosby declined to comment on the case, while representatives for Hefner could not immediately be reached.
Huth is one of more than 50 women who have come forward over the past two years to accuse Cosby of rape and other sexual wrongdoing, mostly involving encounters said to have occurred a decade ago or more.
He was criminally charged in December with sexually assaulting a woman in Pennsylvania in 2004.
The 78-year-old comedian, who personified the model American family man in the long-running hit sitcom “The Cosby Show,” has acknowledged marital infidelity but denied engaging in any non-consensual sexual behaviour.
Several women have said they were victimized by Cosby at the Playboy Mansion, a Gothic Tudor-style estate in the Holmby Hills of west L.A. that has served as a backdrop for some of Hefner’s most lavish, hedonistic parties over the years.
One of those accusers, in a separate lawsuit filed on Wednesday, names both Cosby and Hefner as defendants, alleging that the comedian drugged and raped her at a party thrown by Hefner at his mansion in 2008 when she was 17. The plaintiff, Chloe Goins, said it was Hefner who suggested she and a friend have drinks with Cosby there.
The five-acre compound, which encompasses a tennis court, swimming pool and grotto, was put up for sale by Playboy Enterprises in January, with an asking price of $200 million, on condition that it would remain Hefner’s home and workplace.
(Editing by Mary Milliken)
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