Frank Scotti, Bill Cosby’s associate and NBC employee, claims he paid off women

Frank Scotti, a longtime NBC employee, said he served for years as a sort of middleman between Bill Cosby and the women the comedy icon wanted to see behind closed doors, oftentimes even standing guard so nobody would interrupt — and then paying some up to $2,000 a month.

“He had everybody fooled,” Mr. Scotti said, of Mr. Cosby’s womanizing habits, the New York Daily News reported. “Nobody suspected.

Mr. Scotti, now 90, said he’s coming forward with his story now because of the many sexual abuse allegations about Mr. Cosby that have surfaced in recent days.

He said Mr. Cosby used him to deliver monthly payments to eight different women in 1989 and 1990 — including Shawn Thompson, whose daughter has claimed the actor as her father — and that he believed the actor was having sex with all the women. Mr. Cosby has paid more than $100,000 to Ms. Thompson since 1974, but has denied paternity, the New York Daily News said.

“I was suspicious that something was going on,” he said, the New York Daily News reported. “I suspected that he was having sex with them because the other person he was sending money to [Thompson] he was definitely having sex with. Why else would he be sending money? He was sending these women $2,000 a month. What else could I think?”

Mr. Scotti said he has copies of money orders that show some of the payouts, and said Mr. Cosby would simply give him a “satchel of money, all $100 bills,” and tell him to get money orders in his own name and distribute them to the women, the New York Daily News reported.

“I did a lot of crazy things for him,” Mr. Scotti said, in the newspaper. “He was covering himself by having my name on it. It was a coverup. I realized it later.”

Mr. Scotti worked as a facilities manager at a Brooklyn studio that originally taped “The Cosby Show.” He said that Mr. Cosby would also invite young models from an agency into his Brooklyn dressing room and pick one to stay — ostensibly to get her on his show. Mr. Scotti said the other models would leave while he would stand guard at Mr. Cosby’s door, making sure nobody disturbed his time with the model he selected.