Anyone with any aviation knowledge would likely be filtered out by the defence during jury selection.
Not necessarily. Have seen pilots and mechanics on aviation juries. It all boils down to how the plaintiff wants to sell their version of "duty of care," how sharp the defense side is, and who the jury want to believe. Keep in mind, how the plaintiff defines "duty of care" is not bound by any aviation regulation or in some cases common sense. For example, Part 135 Pilot A doesn't follow various items on a checklist. Pilot A takes off with T/R servo switch in OFF position. Pilot A loses control, hits light pole, and crashes, killing most. Plaintiff convinced jury the helicopter OEM designed a faulty fuel storage system and was awarded $100M. Nothing against Pilot A. And there are many other similar examples both operations and maintenance based. Given the Kobe accident has a wide public following I wouldn't expect less if this does go to trial which I'm sure the ace legal team Kobe's widow has put together is pushing for.