NEWSMAKERS

NEWSMAKERS

Former DA: Cosby is shielded from prosecution

NORRISTOWN, Pa.

The former district attorney who declined a decade ago to bring sex-crime charges against Bill Cosby testified Tuesday that he believes his decision shields the comedian from ever being prosecuted in the case.

Former Montgomery County District Attorney Bruce Castor took the stand at a pretrial hearing in a bid by Cosby’s lawyers to get the case against the TV star thrown out because of what they say is a nonprosecution agreement with Castor.

The current district attorney has said there is no record of any such agreement.

Castor admitted the only place the matter was put in writing was in the 2005 press release announcing his decision not to prosecute.

The proceedings will resume today, when Common Pleas Judge Steven T. O’Neill said he hopes to rule on whether to throw out the case.

Iowa caucus coverage a hit for news networks

NEW YORK

Much like the presidential debates, coverage of the Iowa caucus set new standards for television viewership.

An average of 10.2 million people watched the results of the year’s first presidential contest Monday on CNN, Fox News Channel and MSNBC, the Nielsen company said. Besides Ted Cruz’s mild upset win in the Republican caucus, the Democratic contest was a nail-biter between Hillary Clinton and Bernie Sanders.

That doubled the 5.1 million people who watched Iowa caucus coverage four years ago. The previous high was just under 6 million on the news networks in 2008.

The caucus coverage also more than doubled the viewership for the three news networks during a typical weeknight in January, Nielsen said.

Fox, the longtime cable ratings leader, averaged 4.46 million viewers during the prime-time hours of 8 to 11 p.m. CNN had 3.73 million, and beat Fox within the 25-to-54-year-old demographic upon which advertising sales for most news programs are based. MSNBC had just under 2 million.

For the week of Jan. 25-31, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: Republican Presidential Debate, Fox News Channel, 12.47 million; “Grease: Live,” Fox, 12.21 million; “NCIS,” CBS, 11.98 million; “Scorpion,” CBS, 10.7 million; “Madam Secretary,” CBS, 10.2 million; “NCIS: Los Angeles,” CBS, 10.06 million; “The X-Files” (Monday), Fox, 9.67 million; “American Idol” (Wednesday), Fox, 9.626 million; “The Big Bang Theory,” CBS, 9.625 million; “60 Minutes,” CBS, 9.38 million.

Associated Press