Jayson Williams wants to know the racial make-up of the New Jersey grand jury that indicted him for manslaughter in the shooting of a chauffeur.

Lawyers for the former NBA star filed a motion in Hunterdon County court Monday requesting the information as part of a potential challenge to the indictment on grounds of racial discrimination.

"Because one must know the racial composition of the grand jury in order to determine whether a constitutional violation exists, discovery into the racial background of those summoned is necessary," Williams' attorneys wrote in the motion requesting Judge Edward Coleman to send letters on court stationery to panelists asking them to identify themselves as "black, white or other" and to state whether or not they are Hispanic.

According to a statement from defense lawyers, the motion is just the first of many designed to "intensely scrutinize and vigorously challenge every aspect of the case" against Williams.

Prosecutor Steven Lember was on vacation and could not be reached for comment.

The onetime Net faces 55 years in prison if convicted in the shotgun death of driver Costas "Gus" Christofi at his mansion Feb. 14, 2002. He claims the shooting was an accident, but prosecutors say his behavior was so reckless as to constitute a crime.

In their legal papers, Williams' lawyers suggest that they could challenge the grand jury on the grounds that a racial group had been excluded from the jury for discriminatory reasons or that the panel did not represent a "fair cross-section" of the community.

Hunterdon County, where Williams lives and where his trial is slated to begin in September, is a less diverse region than the state as a whole. According to county census data, about 94 percent of the population is white and about 2 percent black. The state's population is about 73 percent white and 14 percent black.

Williams' father is black and his mother white. Christofi is white.

Williams' defense also filed a motion to separate the manslaughter charges from other counts stemming from his alleged cover-up of the crime afterward. A similar motion filed last year was unsuccessful.