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Bill Cosby Trial: Five Jurors Are Chosen in a Painstaking Process

Bill Cosby arriving for jury selection in his sexual assault case at the Allegheny County Courthouse in Pittsburgh.Credit...Nate Smallwood/Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, via Associated Press

PITTSBURGH — Sorting through a jury pool already exposed to the blaze of publicity over allegations against Bill Cosby, lawyers and a judge on Monday selected the first five jurors, all of them white, who will weigh whether he committed a sexual assault.

The challenge of finding an impartial panel was on full display as jury selection began in the morning at the Allegheny County Courthouse here. When Judge Steven T. O’Neill asked the first 100 potential jurors if they had “heard, read or seen anything” about the case, more than 80 of them raised the numbered cards used to identify them.

A third of the 100 said they had already formed an opinion about Mr. Cosby’s guilt or innocence, and 67 said it would impose a personal hardship on them to serve on the panel, sequestered, for a trial expected to last at least two weeks in June.

In the afternoon, the judge and lawyers on both sides called 21 of the potential jurors for closer questioning, one by one, about how aware they were of the case, and whether they could remain open-minded.

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Juror No. 8, a white middle-aged man, said he could — and could be a fair juror even though a family member had once suffered a sexual assault.

“Acceptable,” said Brian J. McMonagle, one of Mr. Cosby’s lawyers, and prosecutors agreed.

The five jurors ultimately selected, three men and two women, all said they had not formed opinions in the case. As the pool is whittled down to 12 jurors, each side can use up to seven peremptory challenges to eliminate potential jurors without offering a reason; in selecting six alternates, each side will get three more challenges.

The defense team struck four potential jurors on Monday, and the prosecution struck two, including an older black woman.

Mr. Cosby, 79, arrived at the courthouse before 8 a.m., wearing a tan jacket, holding a cane and walking slowly with the help of an aide, and declined to answer reporters’ questions. In the courtroom, sometimes drinking from a bottle of water, he showed keen interest in the jury selection, whispering with his lawyers, leaning forward to hear, and smiling at some of the discussion between the judge and candidates.

Growing impatient that he could not hear potential jurors’ answers, he said loudly, “I am having a problem hearing.” And at one point he remonstrated with his lawyers when they were discussing the acceptability of a middle-aged white woman; “Strike,” said Mr. McMonagle.

The trial comes nearly 17 months after Mr. Cosby was charged with aggravated indecent assault, and more than 13 years after the night that Andrea Constand says Mr. Cosby drugged and sexually assaulted her.

In recent years, dozens of women have accused Mr. Cosby of sexual assault, drawing intense, worldwide attention. But the criminal case rests on what happened in a single encounter with Ms. Constand in 2004, at his home in suburban Philadelphia.

The jury pool is being drawn here because of concerns raised by Mr. Cosby’s defense team that it would be hard to find open-minded jurors in Montgomery County, near Philadelphia, where Mr. Cosby has a home and where the trial is scheduled to start on June 5 in Norristown.

Mr. Cosby’s lawyers had requested instead a larger and more diverse jury pool drawn from Philadelphia or the Pittsburgh area.

“From Cosby’s perspective, the chance to get a Pittsburgh jury rather than a Montgomery County jury would have been appealing,” said Anne Poulin, a professor emeritus of law at Villanova University who is unconnected to the case. “The county’s population is not that diverse and, by reputation, tends to be conservative and perhaps more conviction-prone. By contrast, Pittsburgh offers a more diverse jury pool in terms of race, certainly, and quite likely in terms of social class and political leanings.”

In the wood-paneled courtroom on the third floor of the courthouse, Judge O’Neill stressed the importance of the task before the pool of jurors, and the need to avoid outside views of the case.

“We can’t invite others into this courtroom,” he said.

Mr. Cosby sat largely unnoticed through pretrial hearings but recently gave his first public interview in two years, as his lawyers said they sought to change the public’s perception of him — the “optics” — as the trial nears.

The Cosby story is hard to escape here. On Sunday night, television trucks were parked near the courthouse, ready for Monday’s proceedings, and The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette ran a front-page article on Sunday with the headline “Divided City Awaits Cosby.” An editorial in the newspaper a day earlier chastised Mr. Cosby for breaking his silence just ahead of jury selection, and in particular for his support of a statement by one of his daughters that racism may be behind the allegations made by many of the women.

In proceedings that could take several days, Judge O’Neill and the lawyers will try to select 12 jurors who not only have been unmoved by the pretrial publicity but also are available to be bused 300 miles east to Norristown and sequestered for the duration of the trial. Once selected, the jurors will remain anonymous.

Foreseeing the difficulties of overcoming those factors, the court sent out a jury summons to a larger-than-usual pool: 2,934 people.

“It’s out of the ordinary due to the high-profile nature of the case,” said James Koval, director of communications for Pennsylvania courts, who said a more typical number is 150.

To expedite a selection process involving so many candidates, a questionnaire was sent out with each summons, including such questions as whether a candidate has been the victim of a crime or has religious beliefs that might prevent jury service.

Answers will disqualify some candidates early on.

Representatives from about 20 news media outlets were in the courtroom on the first day for a case that has attracted intense international interest.

Judge O’Neill, of the Montgomery County Court of Common Pleas, is traveling to Allegheny County to supervise the jury selection.

Stuart P. Slotnick, a defense lawyer not involved with the case and a former prosecutor, said Mr. Cosby’s team should be allowed to take its time during jury selection to put the facts of the case before the potential jurors and advocate its position as much as Judge O’Neill will allow.

“In order for Bill Cosby to have a fair trial, which he is entitled to, he needs an impartial jury,” he said. “Unless you have a full and fair opportunity to speak with the juror, you don’t know if they have made up their mind.”

Ms. Constand, a former employee of Temple University in Philadelphia, first went to the police in 2005 with a complaint that Mr. Cosby had drugged and sexually assaulted her. Prosecutors declined to bring charges at the time. Since 2014, however, about 40 other women have come forward with similar allegations and, in 2015, deposition testimony was released in which Mr. Cosby disclosed that he had obtained quaaludes in an effort to have sex with women. Ms. Constand’s case was reopened, and Mr. Cosby was charged in December 2015.

The months since then have involved a legal battle between prosecutors and Mr. Cosby’s lawyers, first over whether to have the charges thrown out, and then over the evidence that will be admitted at trial. Mr. Cosby says he gave Benadryl to Ms. Constand on the night in question and that the sex was consensual.

A version of this article appears in print on  , Section A, Page 20 of the New York edition with the headline: First Five Jurors, All White, Are Painstakingly Chosen for Cosby’s Trial. Order Reprints | Today’s Paper | Subscribe

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