NORRISTOWN, Pa. - Prosecutors set to defend Bill Cosby’s sexual assault conviction in appeals court next month say the accusations from other women are no coincidence, but “the culmination of a decades-long pattern of behaviour.”

The 82-year-old comic actor is the first celebrity convicted and sent to prison in the #MeToo era.

He is serving a three-to-10-year prison term for drugging and molesting a woman at his Philadelphia-area home in 2004.

Cosby’s lawyers are raising a long list of alleged trial errors on appeal. They include the judge’s decision to let five other accusers testify and references to Cosby’s possession of Quaaludes and other drugs.

Montgomery County prosecutors in a filing late Thursday say the women’s testimony is allowed under Pennsylvania law because it points to a “signature” crime.

Arguments in Cosby’s appeal are set for Aug. 12.