Jury Selection For Bill Cosby Retrial Delayed To April 2

NORRISTOWN, PA — Jurors for the upcoming Bill Cosby retrial will be selected from a pool of Montgomery County residents on April 2, Judge Steven T. O'Neill said in an order issued on Sunday. Jury selection had previously been set to begin on March 29.

The jurors are one of the major distinctions and question marks in the coming retrial of the former comedian, now 80. Jurors in Cosby's trial last June were taken from Allegheny County after Cosby's defense team claimed that a local jury would be biased due to years of media coverage.

Cosby faces three counts of aggravated indecent assault after allegedly drugging and molesting Andrea Constand, a Temple University employee, inside his Cheltenham home in 2004.

Last week, in a major development, O'Neill ruled that five of Cosby's former accusers can testify at the upcoming trial. The ruling marks a significant victory for the prosecution, which was only allowed the testimony of one of Cosby's prior accusers, Kelly Johnson, in the 2017 trial that ended in a deadlocked jury.The prosecution had asked the judge for 19 of Cobsy's accusers to be allowed to testify.

The deadlocked jury from the 2017 trial was comprised of six white men, four white women, one black man, and one black woman, and was a point of contention from critics who said the pool was not diverse enough.

Pretrial hearings will be discussed in court on March 29 and 30.

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