Bill Cosby's lawyers claim race bias in jury selection

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Bill Cosby's defense attorneys Brian J. McMonagle, right, and Angela Agrusa talk with reporters after the second day of jury selection in Cosby's sexual assault case at the Allegheny County Courthouse, Tuesday, May 23, 2017, .

Both sides agreed on the two final members Wednesday after debating the panel's racial makeup.

Seven jurors are white men, three are white women and there is one black woman.

Two African Americans, a middle-aged man and a young woman, are a part of the jury.

At times using a cane, Cosby watched jury selection closely this week, conferring often with his defense team. The woman, they explained, was a former Pittsburgh police detective who had been charged, though never convicted, in a department scandal and she had sued the city.

Half of the new jury pool being questioned in Pittsburgh in Bill Cosby's sex assault case says they've formed an opinion on his guilt or innocence. They said the case raised doubts about her credibility.

The case will actually be tried about 300 miles away in Montgomery County, north of Philadelphia, where the criminal charges were filed. They will be sequestered in a hotel for the duration of the trial.

His accuser, Andrea Constand, has alleged that in 2004, Cosby drugged and molested her at his home in Montgomery County, Pennsylvania.

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Cosby has pleaded not guilty to three charges of aggravated indecent assault, claiming any sexual contact or drug consumption was consensual. More than 50 women have come forward over the last two years accusing Cosby of rape and sexual assault decades ago.

Of the 100 potential jurors, 10 were black, and though Cosby's attorneys complained that the prosecution was trying to keep black people from serving on the jury, The Associated Press reported that the judge ruled they had other, valid reasons to reject two black women earlier in the week. Of the new 100 person pool from Allegheny, Penn. - one of the least diverse places in the US - 16 are black.

"There has been a systemic exclusion of African-Americans", McMonagle said in court.

A black woman who said she knows only "basic information" about the case and a white man who initially expressed a tendency to believe police are now on the panel.

See what Cosby's daughter had to say about the controversy in the BET Breaks video, above.

The third day of jury selection at the Allegheny County Courthouse, Downtown, begins this morning, and Cosby is expected to be present again. The defense made what's called a Batson challenge, alleging the Commonwealth was engaging in a systematic pattern of striking black prospective jurors. That man was not selected to serve on the jury. But he laughed aloud and applauded Wednesday afternoon, as one potential juror joked that he had been married for longer than some prison terms for murder.

On Monday, almost a third of the potential jurors summoned said they had already formed an opinion of Cosby's guilt or innocence in the sexual assault allegations lodged against him.

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