Bill Cosby drops defamation lawsuit against Beverly Johnson.

Check out the details after the break.

Comedian Bill Cosby filed a request for dismissal in the case on Friday, according to court records. The 78-year-old comedian sued Beverly Johnson for defamation in December saying that the model lied when she claimed in Vanity Fair and a recent book that he doped and groped her inside his tony townhouse on E. 61st Street in Manhattan.

Beverly Johnson is a pioneer in the modeling world, in 1974 she became the first black model to appear on the cover of Vogue. She claimed that Cosby slipped something in her coffee when she visited him in the mid-80s to read for a bit part on “The Cosby Show.” She claims she realized what was happening before Cosby got very far and that he quickly hustled her outside and dumped her in a cab.

Cosby‘s new paperwork filed in Los Angeles County Superior Court asks for a dismissal “without prejudice,” meaning the comedian wants the right to possibly re-file the complaint at a later date. A spokesperson for Cosby had the following to say,

“The case has been voluntarily dismissed at this time due to the pendency of the criminal proceedings in Montgomery County, PA, which impede Mr. Cosby’s ability to fully participate in litigating the civil case against Ms. Johnson. We fully expect to re-file the complaint against her prior to the expiration of the statute of limitations.”

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