R. Kelly's trial begins with lawyers asking to dismiss charges that the singer knowingly gave women herpes and a prospective juror mistaking him for cartoonist R. Crumb

• Jury selection for R. Kelly's sex-trafficking trial began Monday in federal court in Brooklyn.
• Lawyers asked a judge to dismiss charges related to the singer giving accusers herpes, saying it's not against the law.
• One prospective juror said he thought this whole thing was actually about the cartoonist R. Crumb.

Jury selection began on Monday in R. Kelly's federal sex-trafficking trial in Brooklyn, New York, even as the R&B singer's lawyers asked the judge to dismiss charges related to him giving herpes to some of his accusers.

In a filing on Monday morning, lawyers for Kelly - whose real name is Robert Sylvester Kelly - asked the judge to strike down several of the nine indictments filed against him. The attorneys, Thomas A. Farinella and Nicole Blank Becker, said that prosecutors were wrong in bringing several sex-trafficking charges. They also said the singer should not have been charged with breaking New York law when he was accused of giving two people herpes.

Farinella and Becker argued the relevant law says that transmitting "an acute, bacterial venereal disease such as syphilis or gonorrhea" would be considered a misdemeanor but that giving someone viral diseases such as herpes would not.

Judge Ann Donnelly said she would give prosecutors several days to respond to the motion before making a decision on it.

Several indictments have been brought since Kelly was first arrested and charged in June 2019. Federal prosecutors in Brooklyn accused Kelly and people he employed of recruiting girls for him to have sex with and abuse, and of making pornographic videos out of some of those experiences.

Prosecutors referred to five victims in the indictments under the pseudonym "Jane Doe," three of whom were underage when Kelly is accused of abusing them. The prosecutors also accused Kelly of falsifying identification documents for the singer Aaliyah, referred to as Jane Doe #1, when she was 15 years old so that he could legally marry her. Aaliyah died in 2001.

Kelly has pleaded not guilty to all the charges against him. He appeared in court on Monday in a blue sharkskin suit, a blue shirt, and a bright blue tie and sat alongside his four attorneys. He, the attorneys, and the judge were all unmasked.

Opening statements are scheduled to begin on August 18, and the trial, which has been delayed because of the coronavirus pandemic, is expected to last for four weeks. Kelly faces a separate set of federal sex-trafficking charges in Chicago, as well as state-level sex-related charges in Illinois and Minnesota.

A parade of colorful jurors

Donnelly and the attorneys will select 18 jurors for the trial: 12 will deliberate, and six will serve as alternates.

The judge first addressed prospective jurors in a larger courtroom normally reserved for naturalization ceremonies because of COVID-19 restrictions. No one other than the judge, attorneys, jurors, court staff, and Kelly himself was permitted in the room.

Journalists watched the proceedings through a wide-angled video feed that made it hard to see anyone's expression. The courtroom sketch artist, Jane Rosenberg, peered over the wall separating the gallery and the well to see the details on the video screen as she illustrated them.

Donnelly addressed the prospective jurors only by the jury numbers they were given because of the media attention to the trial. Donnelly also forbade jurors from reading any news coverage of the case and said federal marshals would transport them to and from the courthouse for the duration of the trial.

Prospective jurors were then brought one at a time into a separate room, where Donnelly quizzed them about their ability to be fair in the case. She also asked each about their hobbies and their jobs; a mechanical-engineering student hoped to use his degree to develop roller coasters, while an aspiring fashion illustrator answered only "YouTube" when asked about his hobbies.

One of the men in the jury pool said he was a member of the Association of Old Crows, a professional group for defense contractors who specialize in electronic warfare.

Another man, who said he liked to crochet and had planned a trip to Germany to visit his boyfriend, said he wasn't too familiar with R. Kelly and thought the trial was about Robert Crumb, the 77-year-old cartoonist who signs his work as "R. Crumb."

One of the accusers in the prosecutors' case is a man. Donnelly asked the prospective jurors whether evidence regarding sexual conduct between people of the same sex would impair their fairness.

All of them said that the evidence wouldn't influence their ability to be impartial.

Several people in the jury pool said they had been victims of sexual assault. Donnelly dismissed one who said the experience she had as a child would make it difficult to hear evidence in the case.

The judge questioned 38 prospective jurors on Monday. Thirteen were dismissed based on their answers to some questions. The court is looking to narrow the juror pool to 40 before attorneys use their challenges.

Jury selection is scheduled to resume Tuesday at 9:30 a.m.