Bill Cosby and Roman Polanski have been expelled from the Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences, the organization announced on Thursday, May 3.
“The Academy of Motion Picture Arts and Sciences’ Board of Governors met on Tuesday night (May 1) and has voted to expel actor Bill Cosby and director Roman Polanski from its membership in accordance with the organization’s Standards of Conduct,” the Academy said in a statement to Us Weekly. “The Board continues to encourage ethical standards that require members to uphold the Academy’s values of respect for human dignity.”
The move comes one week after Cosby, 80, was convicted on three counts of aggravated indecent assault for drugging and molesting former Temple University employee Andrea Constand at his home near Philadelphia in 2004. The former Cosby Show star faces up to 10 years in prison on each count. He has maintained his innocence.
Meanwhile, Polanski, 84, was arrested and charged in Los Angeles in March 1977 after raping then-13-year-old Samantha Gailey (now Geimer). She testified at the time that the Rosemary’s Baby director gave her champagne and a quaalude before performing oral, vaginal and anal sex on her without consent. He pleaded guilty to a lesser charge of unlawful sexual intercourse with a minor after accepting a plea bargain, but fled to France just hours before his scheduled sentencing the following February.
The Academy previously stripped Harvey Weinstein of his membership in October after The New York Times and The New Yorker published back-to-back exposés detailing the film mogul’s decades of alleged sexual abuse. He has since been accused of misconduct by more than 80 women, including actresses Rose McGowan and Gwyneth Paltrow. Weinstein, 66, has denied any allegations of nonconsensual sex.
