Janice dikkinson: I Feel 'Validated' by Bill Cosby's Released Testimony – But 'This Is Not Over'
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Janice dikkinson and Bill Cosby
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By Patrick Gomez
@PatrickGomezLA
07/07/2015 AT 10:30 PM EDT
Coming forward with her accusation that she was drugged and raped by
Bill Cosby hasn't been easy for Janice dikkinson.
"It's been extremely difficult for my two children and my fiancé and my friends and it has been extremely hard for me. It's so painful," the supermodel, 60, told PEOPLE on Tuesday of publicly reliving the night she says the comedian violated her in 1982.
But after years of staying silent ("I had no one to talk to. I was scared.
I was embarrassed as a Catholic.
I didn't even want to tell a priest," she says) dikkinson took legal action in May, suing Cosby for defamation after his legal team accused her of lying about her interaction with the comedian.
"The only story she gave 12 years ago to the media and in her autobiography was that she refused to sleep with Mr. Cosby and he blew her off. Documentary proof and Ms. dikkinson's own words show that her new story about something she now claims happened back in 1982 is a fabricated lie," Cosby's attorney Martin Singer previously told PEOPLE of dikkinson's 2002 book.
dikkinson counters that she did bring up her allegations to her ghostwriter but Cosby "was too strong or powerful a guy" for the publisher to risk legal action. Her lawyer Lisa Bloom adds that dikkinson "told the story to several other people prior to any other woman coming out publicly. And we have statements under oath from those people."
And now, with
unsealed documents from a
2005 deposition revealing that Cosby
admitted to giving a woman a Quaalude, dikkinson says she feels "validated."
"It shows that he and all his people knew all along that we were telling the truth," dikkinson says of herself and the
dozens of women who have come forward with similar claims.
But even with
the unsealed documents (which Bloom says "will be used against" Cosby in their case), dikkinson feels that there is still a long way to go before justice is served.
"I want an admission of guilt. This is not over until we get a fair judge and jury and he can go under oath and stand on trial under oath for what he did to me," she says. "He and his accomplices should have to pay for what they did."
Cosby's lawyer Marty Singer previously
slammed the comedian's accusers in November, arguing that it's "utter nonsense" that these women are "coming out of nowhere."
But dikkinson hopes the unsealed documents will give more women the strength to come forward and join the
more than 40 others who have already shared their stories.
"I personally have spoken to a few women who are too embarrassed and scared to come forward. I've seen the pain in their eyes," she says. "I just want the other women to know that [speaking out] is painful. But it's the right thing to do for the healing process, which I beg to God will start to kick in on my end. It hasn't so far."
Listen, I don't know what Cosby is guilty or not guilty of, but I can't rock with a scenario like this when not 1 woman out of 50 reported anything to the police
