PENNSYLVANIA: In a momentous moment for victims of sexual assault everywhere, Bill Cosby is heading to prison for the 2004 sex assault of Andrea Constand, an incident where he drugged and molested her. Montgomery Country Judge Steven O’Neill put the nail in the coffin when he refused to sentence the 81-year-old to probation or “partial confinement” like house arrest.

Categorised as a “sexually violent predator”, the television star will be sentenced to three to 10 years behind bars in a state prison and be listed on the sex offender registry. The judge ignored Cosby’s defence which argued Cosby’s age and legal blindness means he is not a threat to society.

In her testimony, Ms Constand said the comedian once known as America’s Dad, gave her pills that left her “frozen” and unable to stop his assault. Once described as a “young woman brimming with confidence”, Constand says she became a shadow of her former self and stopped eating, sleeping and socialising in the wake of the traumatic event. “To truly understand the impact that the sexual assault has had on my life, you have to understand the person that I was before it happened,” she said in a victim’s impact statement. “Bill Cosby took my beautiful, healthy young spirit and crushed it. He robbed me of my health and vitality, my open nature, and my trust in myself and others.”

For those interested, Constand’s full victim’s impact statement can be found here.

Finally some justice for Cosby’s victims who were left disheartened in June 2017 when a jury deadlocked after 53 hours of deliberations. The judge ruled a mistrial and Cosby walked away a free man. Not today. Time’s Up.