PITTSBURGH – With just one black person seated among the first 11 jurors chosen for Bill Cosby’s sexual assault trial, defense lawyers are crying foul and accusing prosecutors of trying to systematically keep blacks off the jury.
The lawyers return to court on Wednesday in Pittsburgh to pick a 12th juror and six alternates.
For now, Judge Steven O’Neill has rejected the race bias argument.
Prosecutors said race was not a factor in their decision to strike two black women from the panel this week. They said one was a former Pittsburgh police detective who sued the city after she was arrested in a public scandal.
O’Neill pledged to revisit the issue if defense lawyer Brian McMonagle, who had accused prosecutors of “a systematic exclusion of African-Americans,” presented statistical evidence to back that up.