“He just was like smooth, just, you know, hey, just walkin’ through like, ‘I’m O.J.’,” Norris replied. Spectators in the courtroom laughed appreciatively.
It was just the image Simpson’s lawyers wanted conveyed. In five quick-paced days last week, they worked to paint O.J. as a congenial American idol who couldn’t possibly commit two murders, who had no opportunity to commit them and, when he was officially notified of them, was appropriately distraught. The testimony, from Simpson’s mother and daughter to his doctor, was personal, emotional and thus easily digested by jurors. The witnesses even talked in sound bites. Dr. Robert Huizenga, trying to show Simpson was too debilitated to be a killer, said that while O.J. “looked like Tarzan, he was walking more like Tarzan’s grandfather” The defense hoped that the testimony, taken together, could overwhelm the mass of complicated DNA blood evidence linking Simpson to the murders. “The defense knows how to tell a story,” said Stephen Gillers, a New York University law-school professor.
To prosecutors, it was fiction. They suggested that O.J., whom they had tried to depict as a wife-abuser who showed no reaction to Nicole’s death, was just pulling off another acting job. But on the theory that you can’t fool all the people all the time, the defense called more than a dozen so-called demeanor witnesses. They said Simpson was calm and cool before the flight, gladly signing autographs and chatting, and “frantic” and “desperate” on his return, after officially learning of the murders. And although their loyalty is obvious, Simpson’s daughter Arnelle, his two sisters and his mother, Eunice, added to the weight of testimony by describing O.J. as shocked when told of his former wife’s death. “Oh, he seemed very upset,” said his mother, whom the state chose not to cross-examine.
The defense also seemed to advance its case on the question of when Simpson cut the knuckle on his left hand. The state says it happened during the murder struggle, depositing his blood at the scene and elsewhere. But witnesses said they noticed nothing unusual on his flight to Chicago, while two said they saw blood and a bandage on his return. That fits the defense contention that he cut his hand most severely in his hotel room. Worse for the prosecution, a series of mostly credible witnesses, from dog-walkers to a couple on a blind date, suggested by their testimony that the murders occurred much later than 10:15 p.m., as the state’s own set of dog-walkers suggest. A later time for the murders could mean that Simpson would not have had the opportunity to carry them out and return in time to make the flight.
Despite this testimony, the state continued to extract more evidence for its own case. Under a wily cross-examination by Christopher Darden, a defense witness, Robert Heidstra, admitted he saw a white sport utility vehicle, possibly a Ford Bronco like Simpson’s, speeding away from the crime scene around 10:40 p.m. While walking his dogs that night, Heidstra, a car detailer, said he also heard two men quarreling. Darden accused him of telling acquaintances that one sounded like a young white male and the other an older black man, a characterization Heidstra heatedly denied.
Drug theory: The defense was hurt in its attempt to answer the question baffling millions of trial watchers: if Simpson didn’t do it, who did? The defense wanted to pursue the notion that Colombian drug dealers, planning to rub out Nicole’s cocaine-addicted friend Faye Resnick, had instead killed Nicole and Ronald Goldman by mistake. But calling the theory “highly speculative,” Judge Lance Ito effectively banished it by limiting any testimony of Resnick’s former fiance about her drug use.
That leaves the defense with a case that is designed to raise reasonable doubt. To that end, Newsweek has learned, the defense will return this week to its theme of a frame-up by the LAPD, particularly Det. Mark Fuhrman. The defense may not recall Fuhrman but says it has lined up several witnesses who will attack his character and credibility by testifying they have heard him make racist statements in the last 10 years, which he explicitly denied on the stand earlier. He couldn’t be reached for comment on what one defense source characterized as the “Fuhrman funeral.” Given the speed of their case so far, defense sources are now predicting they will conclude in two to three weeks. The hope: jurors will find a way to show their appreciation.
The Marcia Clark and Chris Darden Show runs on only two speeds–nice and nasty. Will the jury get turned off?
Dream Team strides toward reasonable doubt, but witness puts Bronco at the crime scene and Ito bars drug-lords defense.
Quick and solid rulings keep case on fast track, even if he did lose his cool over the racial bickering between lawyers.
