NEWSMAKERS

NEWSMAKERS

Court puts Cosby’s criminal case on hold

Bill Cosby’s criminal sex-assault case was halted temporarily days before a key hearing while a Pennsylvania appeals court considers his effort to have the case thrown out before trial.

The Pennsylvania Superior Court granted Cosby a postponement Tuesday while the court decides whether to hear Cosby’s pretrial appeal. His preliminary hearing had been set for next week.

Cosby, 78, is accused of drugging and molesting a Temple University employee in his suburban Philadelphia home in 2004.

He said he had a promise from a former district attorney that he would never be charged over his encounter with Andrea Constand. However, a different district attorney reopened the case last year and filed charges in December, weeks before the statute of limitations expired.

The preliminary hearing to determine if probable cause exists to send the case to trial had been set for next Tuesday. The hearing seemed likely to be postponed unless the Superior Court quickly decided to quash his appeal.

Prosecutors have argued that he does not have the right to a pretrial appeal and instead should file the usual post-trial appeal if he is convicted. A Montgomery County judge who heard two days of evidence on the issue agreed and refused to ask the appeals court to intervene. The judge, Common Pleas Judge Steven O’Neill, could end up with the case if it goes to trial.

Cosby has posted $1 million bail in the Pennsylvania case. He faces five to 10 years in prison if convicted of felony indecent assault.

Black viewership does better than overall Oscars audience

NEW YORK

Don’t blame the effort to promote an Oscars boycott among blacks because of diversity concerns for the drop in Academy Awards viewership this year.

The Nielsen company said Tuesday that an estimated 3.22 million black viewers watched the Oscars on ABC Sunday, a decline of 2 percent from the 2015 show. The show’s overall viewership of 34.4 million was an eight-year low, and a drop of nearly 8 percent from the year before.

The Oscars enabled ABC to take a rare prime-time win in the Nielsens, as the network averaged 9.4 million viewers. CBS had 7.8 million viewers, NBC had 4.4 million, Fox had 4 million, Univision had 1.9 million, the CW had 1.8 million, ION Television had 1.3 million and Telemundo had 1.2 million.

CNN was the week’s most popular cable network, averaging 2.36 million in prime time with the help of a Republican presidential debate. Fox News Channel had 2.03 million, USA had 1.7 million, HGTV had 1.69 million and TBS had 1.63 million.

For the week of Feb. 22-28, the top 10 shows, their networks and viewerships: Academy Awards, ABC, 34.43 million; “Live From the Red Carpet, Part 3,” ABC, 22.28 million; “NCIS,” CBS, 17.47 million; “The Big Bang Theory,” CBS, 15.94 million; “Live From the Red Carpet, Part 2,” ABC, 15.7 million; Republican Presidential Debate, CNN, 13.1 million; “The Walking Dead,” AMC, 12.79 million; “NCIS: New Orleans,” CBS, 12.6 million; “Live From the Red Carpet, Part 1,” ABC, 11.53 million; “Blue Bloods,” CBS, 10.33 million.

Associated Press