American Crime Story Book Club

[psychoticstate]

For Kindle-owning Amazon Prime members, Clark's new novel Blood Defense is one of the free book options for April.  It's not my usual genre, but I have to admit I snapped it up due to the show.

 

LilWharveyGal, I'm an Amazon Prime member but I don't see where I can get Blood Defense for free.  I do see where Without a Doubt is free if you have Kindle Unlimited but Blood Defense is showing as a pre-order only on my screen. 

[LilWharveyGal]

I think the Kindle may be the key.  I get an email each month with the free choices, but it looks like the options can also be found on the Amazon website if you click on Your Prime Membership and then it's under Kindle Books.

[psychoticstate]

I think the Kindle may be the key.  I get an email each month with the free choices, but it looks like the options can also be found on the Amazon website if you click on Your Prime Membership and then it's under Kindle Books.

 

Got it!  Thank you!!

[Simon Boccanegra]

A big recommendation for Daniel Petrocelli's Triumph of Justice, for anyone like me who followed the civil case without the same rapt attention as the criminal case and wants to know more of the details. I finished it last night. It's a long book but worth it; it is never dull, and it clarifies some evidentiary matters that remained inky at the time of the criminal trial.  

 

Petrocelli had read Bugliosi's Outrage and had been inspired by it, and there is something of Bugliosi's intensity and flair for "courtroom theater" in the way he aggressively went after Simpson. Example: Simpson's lawyer made a cynical remark about how anybody can file a lawsuit for $200 and then strike it rich. Petrocelli to the jury: "Have they become so insensitive to the greatest of human tragedies, the loss of life, that they want to speak about these two dead people in terms of two hundred dollars? [...] You know, Mr. Simpson, here's two hundred dollars! You want it? [reaching into his own pockets and shaking cash at Simpson] Bring me back my client's son!" 

 

He gave passionate, emotional closing arguments and he projected strong belief in his case, unlike Darden, who was diffident (near exact quote: "We've tried to present the best evidence we can, and if we haven't presented the best evidence, don't hold it against us"), and Clark (who was exhausted and looked/sounded it, and kept saying "I think" and "I believe" as if vague on details).

 

Even Judge Fujisaki, who was unsentimental to say the least (glaring at the lawyers to get them to wrap it up quickly when a grieving Brown/Goldman or a "singing the praises of OJ" type was on the stand), was tearing up at one point, when Petrocelli was questioning Fred Goldman.    

 

Petrocelli also made a good point I hadn't considered. Simpson's flippancy about Ronald Goldman ("Ron Goldman doesn't mean that much to me. People die every day") was very telling. If there had been a theoretical "real killer," Simpson should have been grateful to Goldman. Goldman arrived to bring over the glasses, and there's at least a strong possibility he tried to save the life of Simpson's ex-wife and the mother of his children. Maybe his intervention saved the lives of Simpson's sleeping children from this "real killer," made him flee the scene more quickly. Had Simpson wanted to appear blameless, he should have been talking of Goldman as an heroic figure. But of course, that isn't what happened.  

 

Simpson's main lawyer, Robert Baker, Cochran's hand-picked surrogate, also gave him a vigorous defense, but his heart seemed to go out of it toward the end. There was at least a strong suggestion that he felt hung out to dry when new evidence surfaced during the trial that contradicted Simpson. Simpson had sworn up and down that the first photograph to emerge of him wearing the "murder shoes" was a fake (it had first appeared in the Enquirer), but then 30 similar photos surfaced, including one that had been printed in the Buffalo Bills newsletter. So the defense Simpson's team was riding on looked very silly, and I don't imagine Baker took well to being sandbagged. He had surely urged Simpson to level with him about what might be out there, and then had constructed a defense on the assumption of attorney/client transparency.  

Edited April 9, 2016 by Simon Boccanegra

[psychoticstate]

A big recommendation for Daniel Petrocelli's Triumph of Justice, for anyone like me who followed the civil case without the same rapt attention as the criminal case and wants to know more of the details. I finished it last night. It's a long book but worth it; it is never dull, and it clarifies some evidentiary matters that remained inky at the time of the criminal trial.  

 

Petrocelli had read Bugliosi's Outrage and had been inspired by it, and there is something of Bugliosi's intensity and flair for "courtroom theater" in the way he aggressively went after Simpson. Example: Simpson's lawyer made a cynical remark about how anybody can file a lawsuit for $200 and then strike it rich. Petrocelli to the jury: "Have they become so insensitive to the greatest of human tragedies, the loss of life, that they want to speak about these two dead people in terms of two hundred dollars? [...] You know, Mr. Simpson, here's two hundred dollars! You want it? [reaching into his own pockets and shaking cash at Simpson] Bring me back my client's son!" 

 

He gave passionate, emotional closing arguments and he projected strong belief in his case, unlike Darden, who was diffident (near exact quote: "We've tried to present the best evidence we can, and if we haven't presented the best evidence, don't hold it against us"), and Clark (who was exhausted and looked/sounded it, and kept saying "I think" and "I believe" as if vague on details).

 

Even Judge Fujisaki, who was unsentimental to say the least (glaring at the lawyers to get them to wrap it up quickly when a grieving Brown/Goldman or a "singing the praises of OJ" type was on the stand), was tearing up at one point, when Petrocelli was questioning Fred Goldman.    

 

Petrocelli also made a good point I hadn't considered. Simpson's flippancy about Ronald Goldman ("Ron Goldman doesn't mean that much to me. People die every day") was very telling. If there had been a theoretical "real killer," Simpson should have been grateful to Goldman. Goldman arrived to bring over the glasses, and there's at least a strong possibility he tried to save the life of Simpson's ex-wife and the mother of his children. Maybe his intervention saved the lives of Simpson's sleeping children from this "real killer," made him flee the scene more quickly. Had Simpson wanted to appear blameless, he should have been talking of Goldman as an heroic figure. But of course, that isn't what happened.  

 

Simpson's main lawyer, Robert Baker, Cochran's hand-picked surrogate, also gave him a vigorous defense, but his heart seemed to go out of it toward the end. There was at least a strong suggestion that he felt hung out to dry when new evidence surfaced during the trial that contradicted Simpson. Simpson had sworn up and down that the first photograph to emerge of him wearing the "murder shoes" was a fake (it had first appeared in the Enquirer), but then 30 similar photos surfaced, including one that had been printed in the Buffalo Bills newsletter. So the defense Simpson's team was riding on looked very silly, and I don't imagine Baker took well to being sandbagged. He had surely urged Simpson to level with him about what might be out there, and then had constructed a defense on the assumption of attorney/client transparency.  

 

 

This part is so true and something that I have thought and remembered for years.  Ron should have been a hero to Simpson for attempting to aid the mother of his children, if nothing else.  For him to allow his attorneys to besmirch Ron's character by insinuating that Ron would never have amounted to anything and would have been lucky to have a credit card (after Petrocelli had told the jury how Ron wanted to open his own restaurant and was working toward that goal) was lower than low.   

 

Simpson always saw himself as a victim - - the only victim maybe.  Nicole deserved it and who gave a rat's ass about Ron?  

 

I also think that make the claim that anyone can file a suit for $200 was amazingly insensitive toward the Goldmans and Browns.  Clearly the civil suit was not about money; it's never been about money.  Most plaintiffs don't offer to drop a suit of that magnitude if the defendant will just admit guilt.

 

And let me second your recommendation of Petrocelli's book.  I still have my first edition of it and it's well worth the read.

[Sir RaiderDuck OMS]

I read about a dozen books about the OJ trial after the verdict (I was raising our infant daughter all day, so I had plenty of time to read). These are my picks:

 

Best overall summation of the trial: Toobin's book

 

Most self-serving: Shapiro's, Darden's and Clark's (tie)

(One senses that Shapiro was sorry for ever getting mixed up in the trial in the first place, and is trying to make amends by complimenting everyone except Cochran and Bailey)

 

Best insight as to why Darden was a horrible choice for co-prosecutor: Gerry Spence's OJ: The Last Word

(Briefly: Darden was the only African-American prosecutor in the DA's office, and that fact would make an jury composed of African-Americans feel patronized when it came out.)

 

Best collection of trial tidbits: Dominick Dunne's Another City, Not My Own

(Example: One day when key DNA evidence was being presented by the prosecution, Nicole's younger sister Tanya showed up in the gallery with her boyfriend and they spent the entire day necking. The jury, offended as hell, ignored what was being presented and instead spent hours on end glaring at the pair. Dunne's avatar Gus Bailey remarks that he'd never seen a victim's family that was so unlikable.)

 

Most emotional: The Goldman family's book His Name is Ron

Edited April 25, 2016 by Sir RaiderDuck OMS

[Moose135]

I'm struggling through Bugliosi's book, but his outrage is too much for me (pun intended). I don't doubt he's right but the sarcasm and anger make it difficult to read—I mean that literally. There are times he actually says, "I mean that sarcastically, of course." That's just bad writing and poor editing.

 

I've read some of his stuff and seen him on TV in the past, and mostly enjoyed it, so I downloaded this one during the series.  I'm about half way through, and it is a tough read.  He does make good points about the way the trial was handled, but to to hear him tell it, just about everyone not named "Bugliosi" is an incompetent idiot, and he comes off as a bit self-serving in his "outrage" over the case.

[psychoticstate]

On 4/25/2016 at 9:20 AM, Sir RaiderDuck OMS said:

I read about a dozen books about the OJ trial after the verdict (I was raising our infant daughter all day, so I had plenty of time to read). These are my picks:
 
Best overall summation of the trial: Toobin's book
 
Most self-serving: Shapiro's, Darden's and Clark's (tie)
(One senses that Shapiro was sorry for ever getting mixed up in the trial in the first place, and is trying to make amends by complimenting everyone except Cochran and Bailey)
 
Best insight as to why Darden was a horrible choice for co-prosecutor: Gerry Spence's OJ: The Last Word
(Briefly: Darden was the only African-American prosecutor in the DA's office, and that fact would make an jury composed of African-Americans feel patronized when it came out.)
 
Best collection of trial tidbits: Dominick Dunne's Another City, Not My Own
(Example: One day when key DNA evidence was being presented by the prosecution, Nicole's younger sister Tanya showed up in the gallery with her boyfriend and they spent the entire day necking. The jury, offended as hell, ignored what was being presented and instead spent hours on end glaring at the pair. Dunne's avatar Gus Bailey remarks that he'd never seen a victim's family that was so unlikable.)
 
Most emotional: The Goldman family's book His Name is Ron

Great list!

I second that the Goldman family's book was most emotional.  I think I cried all the way through it.

I thought Fuhrman's book was actually quite good - - as I also thought his book on the Martha Moxley murder was.  If you can forget (at least momentarily) the racist comments that were made on the tapes, the investigative portion is thorough and informative.

I have not read Dunne's Another City, Not My Own but your comments make me want to.  I think I need to pick up my jaw from the floor.  Not only is a courtroom in general a poor choice for a makeout session but at the trial of your sister's killer?  What??  Was there no other family member (or heck, anyone) to tell Tanya to knock it off?   It does seem that the Brown family did not come across sympathetically, which was unfortunate for Nicole and Ron.  I do agree with Bugliosi's take, which was to take the family to task for not having someone attending the trial and representing Nicole in court every day.  

[Hanahope]

Quote

Was there no other family member (or heck, anyone) to tell Tanya to knock it off? 

Such as maybe a judge?  I'm sure you could fill a book with all the errors made by Ito.

 

Quote

The defense team had an expert doing pretty much everything for them, while the prosecution team's guy only ended up helping them put together a couple of mock trials. They wound up doing all the heavy lifting for jury selection themselves

The defense jury expert was no doubt paid by Simpson, who apparently had money to burn (at least before the trial).  The prosecution was more limited on what they could pay an expert and for how long.  I'm not surprised the prosecution's jury expert didn't do as much.  Usually, its the other way around, since most criminal defendants are poor and can't afford any experts.

Edited April 28, 2016 by Hanahope

[Hanahope]

I've started reading Marcia Clark's book "Without a Doubt", since I wanted to get more info on the prosecution's side.  In turns out, their 'jury expert' volunteered his services, so they really had no control over him and he didn't follow a lot of their requests.  Clark also thought this jury expert was pretty condescending to her, so its a bit understandable that she didn't put much faith in his research on black female jurors.

I also learned that for all the complaining about the trial being in downtown LA, instead of Santa Monica, apparently that was required.  They didn't have a choice due to prior court rules that required any 'long term' trial to be held in downtown.  The only reason the Rodney King trial ended up in Simi Valley was because the judge assigned to it, in downtown LA, ended up transferring to Simi Valley and insisted he take the case with him.  Since it had already been assigned to that judge, the prosecution had to allow it.

I'm only about 1/3 of the way through it, so still a lot of trial to go through.  But from what I've read so far, the biggest mistakes were (a) Ito (maybe that's why of everyone, he didn't write a book); (b) the initial police detective/investigation (treating OJ as a celebrity rather than a suspect).  Clark says how the prosecution could have 'papered' Ito to request a different judge (i.e. like a peremptory juror challenge) or even that because of Ito's wife, possibly challenged him without using their peremptory. Clark says they weren't happy with Ito, but were afraid of getting a 'worse' judge (as they would have to take the next judge selected no matter what), but now in hindsight she doesn't know how another judge could have been much worse.

That said, there's a lot I still question.  Marcia talks a lot about how she's so busy with the case that she doesn't have time to follow up on certain things that end up biting later (example, Furhman gave an early heads up that his past/employee file may pose problems, and Clark makes a "mental note" to follow up and get his file, but then doesn't).  I just don't see how she's so busy to do these things that seem pretty important, she doesn't explain exactly what is keeping her busy. Sure, there are witness statements and lab tests to review, but those are generally only a few pages.  She mentions the very brief time she spends with witnesses before their testimony at the indictment and preliminary hearing, usually just minutes.   I'm curious as to the exact details during this time (before trial) that prevented her from getting these things done.  And further, why the prosecution didn't assign more junior attorneys to help out.  So far, the book doesn't explain this.

[Ailianna]

One of the things that many prosecutors take for granted but that outsiders often don't realize is just how limited resources are.  At the initial stages of the case, I'm sure she had a number of other cases.  By the trial, I'm sure someone was on the ball to take them over, and she hadn't gotten too many new cases, but a prosecutor at her level may easily have 50 to 60 cases at any one time.  So this wasn't the only thing to do. 
We are also viewing this from hindsight.  We know the Furhman bomb, but he should have been more open about it, if he mentioned it. Most cops have some little thing in their file--a reprimand for being off post, or not enough tickets, or a lot of civilian complaints, even if they're unfounded.  She probably had the thought that there was some stupid thing--I know one cop who is constantly being moved around against his will because he slept with the wife of another officer, and his department moves him every time the other officer moves so they never work together.  A lot of things aren't huge, but might bother an individual person.  No way he told her he got counseling because LAPD made him racist. 

And to really review lab reports, there's not just the couple of pages of the report itself, there's hundreds of pages of underlying material.  And there were a lot of tests in this case when you start adding up every drop of blood that was tested.  Reading witness reports isn't just reading the page and moving on.  Part of it is also placing them in context against other statements and police reports, and looking for inconsistencies, overlap, level of cooperation, et cetera.  And that's without an ongoing lead desk, which I'm sure they had, for all the evidence that comes in, or false leads as well, during the course of a case. 

The idea of adding additional junior lawyers is nice, but a prosecutor's office has a pretty fixed budget, and may even have to get hiring approval from another government body (city counsel, county legislature, so on).  And let's not forget, other crime in LA didn't stop, so everyone who was put on this case, other people had to shoulder their workloads.

I haven't read the book and so I'm not commenting directly on it, but there's a lot of things that go on that she may simply not have thought to include, since it was so obvious to her.

[BW Manilowe]

I haven't read the book either, but perhaps another reason why there was some stuff she wanted to review & didn't get to--besides those cited by @Ailianna above--is the fact she was also a single mother trying to raise 2 sons, & she was in the middle of a custody fight over at least 1 of the boys (as I remember) at the time.

[Hanahope]

Those are all good points.  Maybe she will go into those details later in the book.  Just at this point, she hasn't and as someone who didn't work in a prosecutor's office, I don't know how it all works.  I do recall her saying near the beginning that she got the Simpson case because she didn't have a lot of other cases at that time.

One point she did make that adversely affected the prosecution was that this was one of the extremely few times that the defense insisted on a "speedy trial."  She mentions that the vast majority of the time, the defense drags their feet asking for numerous extensions, mostly she states, hoping that witnesses go away, forget, or otherwise become less helpful.  But with Simpson, the defense pushed for the earliest date available, more than likely hoping that the amount of evidence would prove to be so overwhelming, that mistakes would be made, as there were.  And of course, for the defense, they had multiple attorneys (and their staffs) handling the different issues.  It really was a case of endless available money and resources v. limited resourses, not race.

[Hanahope]

So I finished the book.  While Clark acknowledges some mistakes she and the prosecution did (biggie - the glove - the prosecution was supposed to have duplicates for Simpson to try one - which they eventually did, but when the duplicates weren't immediately available, Darden insisted on Simpson trying on the blood soaked ones), she places a huge part of the blame on Ito.  Yes, the defense got away with a lot of shit, but Ito allowed them to do it.

One critique I (and others) always had with the prosecution was the length of the trial and asking why couldn't the prosecution trim things down so it didn't last months.  Well, as it turned out, it wasn't the prosecution's fault.  Yes, they did have a lot of evidence to present and that still would have taken time, but the biggest reason the case took so long was the defense and Ito.  Basically, the prosecution would call a witness and aske their questions.  Usually, the defense is then limited on cross-examination to questions raised in the initial testimony, plus some lee-way on credibility.  Then, when the defense presents their case, they can call (or recall) witnesses to ask questions to build up a defense.  But Ito allowed the Simpson defense to ask anything and everything, even stuff to which no foundation had been laid and that took weeks.  For example, Johnny Cochran would ask Paul Vanatter all sorts of off the wall questions about other possible theories (like the whole Columbian necklace/necktie bit).  So what should have been a day or two of direct exam, followed by a day or two of cross, would turn into a two week of cross.

You can see the difference in a judge who takes control of a court room and doesn't allow extraneous shit to muddy everything up just by looking at the civil judge for the Simpson case.  Criminal case - almost a year; civil case - a few months.

This also affected my other criticism, which was why the prosecution witnesses weren't better prepared by the attorneys.  Yes, I still have that to some extent (like why didn't the prosecutors tell their witnesses  - don't agree with every stupid little thing the defense attorney suggests, Mr. Paul Vanatter and Mr. Dennis Fung), but the prosecution also didn't realize that Ito was going to let the defense float every crack-pot idea in the universe in front of these witnesses to see which might stick.

Ito couldn't have bent over backward to the Simpson team more if he was a Cirque de Soleil performer.  Maybe he was afraid of being appealed/reversed?  I don't know.  But Clark reported on some of things that Ito allowed that was just unheard of.  Like allowing Simpson to make an entire statement of his innocence when saying he wasn't going to testify on the stand.  Of course, the whole ruse of certain events not occuring with the jury there was meaningless when the juror's family could report the exact event to them at visitations.  And certainly, the fact that Ito allowed the defense team to make race an issue in the case with the "n" word, and using that clearly collateral issue to completely destroy Fuhrman's credibility on one piece of evidence that ended up overshadowing a huge amount of other unrefutted evidence that only pointed to one person.

Clark says her biggest regret is not requesting Ito be replaced immediately, which they were allowed to do.  Yes, the prosecution had other problems, the blood collection was still sloppy at times, and Vanatter still took a horrible statement from Simpson, but they might have had a conviction chance with a different judge.  Throughout the trial, the prosecution played by normal rules,. but the defense didn't have to, and got away with so much because the judge essentially let them do whatever they wanted.

[psychoticstate]

On 9/20/2016 at 9:21 AM, Hanahope said:

So I finished the book.  While Clark acknowledges some mistakes she and the prosecution did (biggie - the glove - the prosecution was supposed to have duplicates for Simpson to try one - which they eventually did, but when the duplicates weren't immediately available, Darden insisted on Simpson trying on the blood soaked ones), she places a huge part of the blame on Ito.  Yes, the defense got away with a lot of shit, but Ito allowed them to do it.

One critique I (and others) always had with the prosecution was the length of the trial and asking why couldn't the prosecution trim things down so it didn't last months.  Well, as it turned out, it wasn't the prosecution's fault.  Yes, they did have a lot of evidence to present and that still would have taken time, but the biggest reason the case took so long was the defense and Ito.  Basically, the prosecution would call a witness and aske their questions.  Usually, the defense is then limited on cross-examination to questions raised in the initial testimony, plus some lee-way on credibility.  Then, when the defense presents their case, they can call (or recall) witnesses to ask questions to build up a defense.  But Ito allowed the Simpson defense to ask anything and everything, even stuff to which no foundation had been laid and that took weeks.  For example, Johnny Cochran would ask Paul Vanatter all sorts of off the wall questions about other possible theories (like the whole Columbian necklace/necktie bit).  So what should have been a day or two of direct exam, followed by a day or two of cross, would turn into a two week of cross.

You can see the difference in a judge who takes control of a court room and doesn't allow extraneous shit to muddy everything up just by looking at the civil judge for the Simpson case.  Criminal case - almost a year; civil case - a few months.

This also affected my other criticism, which was why the prosecution witnesses weren't better prepared by the attorneys.  Yes, I still have that to some extent (like why didn't the prosecutors tell their witnesses  - don't agree with every stupid little thing the defense attorney suggests, Mr. Paul Vanatter and Mr. Dennis Fung), but the prosecution also didn't realize that Ito was going to let the defense float every crack-pot idea in the universe in front of these witnesses to see which might stick.

Ito couldn't have bent over backward to the Simpson team more if he was a Cirque de Soleil performer.  Maybe he was afraid of being appealed/reversed?  I don't know.  But Clark reported on some of things that Ito allowed that was just unheard of.  Like allowing Simpson to make an entire statement of his innocence when saying he wasn't going to testify on the stand.  Of course, the whole ruse of certain events not occuring with the jury there was meaningless when the juror's family could report the exact event to them at visitations.  And certainly, the fact that Ito allowed the defense team to make race an issue in the case with the "n" word, and using that clearly collateral issue to completely destroy Fuhrman's credibility on one piece of evidence that ended up overshadowing a huge amount of other unrefutted evidence that only pointed to one person.

Clark says her biggest regret is not requesting Ito be replaced immediately, which they were allowed to do.  Yes, the prosecution had other problems, the blood collection was still sloppy at times, and Vanatter still took a horrible statement from Simpson, but they might have had a conviction chance with a different judge.  Throughout the trial, the prosecution played by normal rules,. but the defense didn't have to, and got away with so much because the judge essentially let them do whatever they wanted.

Really well written post.

I think Ito sunk the case from the beginning.  He should have recused himself after the connection between Furhman and his wife came up but he didn't.  He may have been afraid of being appealed/reversed with regard to his backbending butt kissing to Simpson and the defense but I think he was mostly playing to the cameras.  He was hyper-aware of them and their presence and I have always felt they were the reason he felt it was necessary for public good for the Fuhrman tapes to be released.  I never understood how the tapes were relevant to the public while the trial was going on.  

He also absolutely belittled the prosecution by addressing them as "Marcia" and "Chris" and giving the defense the respect of calling them "Mr. Cochran," "Mr. Shapiro," etc.  It doesn't seem like much but don't think the jury didn't notice.

As far as the prosecution and witnesses, I do think they made a huge mistake in not protecting Furhman.  He was their witness.  It doesn't matter whether they liked him or not or believed him to be the biggest racist asshole on the planet.  He was their witness.  Instead of turning her back to him, Clark should have demonstrated calmly and simply how impossible it would have been for Fuhrman to plant evidence and frame Simpson.  What mattered should have been what he did or didn't do in this particular case.  The prosecution got flustered and acted as offended as the defense.  Big mistake. 

A side note - - I recently listened to Furhman's audio book on the media (can't recall the name right now.)  An interesting listen.  Of course he talks about the Simpson case.  He said that his partner Brad Roberts actually collected more evidence than he did and was present at the scene longer.  He had suggested to Clark that she call Roberts as a witness.  She brushed him off and said she had no use for Roberts but insisted on calling Fuhrman.  Even if the tapes had not surfaced and the racial angle was not played, it makes no sense why Clark wouldn't call Roberts.  She called both Lange and Vannatter.  I get you wouldn't want to call every single officer/detective on the scene (Furhman was the 17th one to show up) but why wouldn't you call Fuhrman's partner who was there and who discovered more evidence than Furhman?  

He also said that he did not want to leave the Bundy crime scene and was overruled by either Lange or Vannatter to go to Rockingham.  He said that one of them had allowed the media to set up shop after moving the crime scene tape and lines back to give the MEDIA more room to operate rather than thinking about preserving the scene.  He also said that when the search warrant was delivered at Rockingham one of those detectives was going to hand over the original versus the copy and while he wanted the Bronco cordoned off for impounding immediately, he was overruled on that as well.  And the Rockingham media used the hood of that vehicle to put their coffee cups on.

Absolutely unbelievable.  And no excuse.  LAPD handles a lot of cases and this one should have been done by the book instead of making exceptions because a celebrity was connected to it. 

[Hanahope]

13 hours ago, psychoticstate said:

Instead of turning her back to him, Clark should have demonstrated calmly and simply how impossible it would have been for Fuhrman to plant evidence and frame Simpson.  What mattered should have been what he did or didn't do in this particular case.  The prosecution got flustered and acted as offended as the defense.  Big mistake. 

A side note - - I recently listened to Furhman's audio book on the media (can't recall the name right now.)  An interesting listen.  Of course he talks about the Simpson case.  He said that his partner Brad Roberts actually collected more evidence than he did and was present at the scene longer.  He had suggested to Clark that she call Roberts as a witness.  She brushed him off and said she had no use for Roberts but insisted on calling Fuhrman.  Even if the tapes had not surfaced and the racial angle was not played, it makes no sense why Clark wouldn't call Roberts.  She called both Lange and Vannatter.  I get you wouldn't want to call every single officer/detective on the scene (Furhman was the 17th one to show up) but why wouldn't you call Fuhrman's partner who was there and who discovered more evidence than Furhman?

From what Clark said, she did demonstrate the impossibility of Fuhrman's planting the glove on direct and redirect.  She claims she supported him fully, until the tapes came out and then she couldn't do anything because he took the fifth.

Clark also said that they had to stick with Fuhrman because he found the Rockingham glove, which they felt was an important piece of evidence given its match to the Bundy glove.  He also was the one who saw/found the blood on and inside the Bronco.  She didn't discuss Roberts in her book.  I suspect, though, that she found it sufficient to get his evidence in by others.  She said she had to call Lange and Vannatter because they were the lead detectives and it was almost required she call them.  Specifically she mentions that it would have looked very bad by the police dept./brass that she had to work with, if she didn't call the leads.  

[Inquisitionist]

On ‎3‎/‎26‎/‎2016 at 9:05 PM, Aethera said:

I grabbed the audio book of The Run of His Life last week, and have been listening to it on my commutes. The guy they got to narrate it (Stephen Bel Davies), no idea who he is, but he's got this great gossipy tone that's really working. Feels like he's relating the whole story to you in a bar. Perfect for Toobin's writing.  There's also a version that Toobin himself reads, no idea how that sounds though.

I haven't read The Run of His Life, but I just finished Toobin's book American Heiress about the Patricia Hearst kidnaping, and I must say the guy never met a detail he didn't love, no matter how inconsequential or superfluous.  AH reads like an extended treatment for another season of American Crime Story. 

[Umbelina]

For anyone that wasn't alive or old enough to really pay attention to the media circus of a trial back then?  You could see Ito becoming seduced by fame as the trial began, the fame of the defendant was only part of it, it seemed to be his OWN fame that he was really enjoying, and that felt like his downfall as a judge.  He played more and more to the cameras, I think he was thrilled with the nightly "dancing Ito's" on the tonight show, and all of the press he was getting, not to mention being on TV each and every day, both live, and in news and news magazine spots, hell, he was everywhere.  He certainly seemed to enjoy that.

The OJ case became bigger than the Soaps it bumped off the air, changed the face of "court TV" and essentially television itself. 

I read most of the early books but it was ages ago.  The Dollar Store had the majority of them a few years after the case ended, I remember going in there for ribbon and seeing a few of them, picked up Clark's and Darden's first.  A few weeks later there was one of Furhman's, and I remember I hated him so much, and still blamed him for OJ getting off, so I almost didn't buy it at all.  I went back and picked it up, and I was glad I did.  Even though, at the time, I detested him?  His book made a horrifying amount of sense, and I felt it was pretty accurate and truthful, and in some ways, the most detailed and informative book of all. 

I'd read previous Bugliosi books, so got that one as well, long excerpt here:  http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/style/longterm/books/chap1/outrage.htm 

I'm pretty sure Toobin's never showed up at the dollar store, at some point I did read it though.

OJ's?  No.  I've read the reviews which hit all the highlights, but even for a dollar, I could not buy his book.

That was such a sad time, and it was about much more than the murders themselves.  The trial, the circus, the overt racism on all sides, and the exploitation of that made me sick to my stomach.  After the verdict?  Some people I knew celebrated, and many were in tears, and yes, it broke strictly along racial lines among the people I knew.  It was horrible.