Fuhrman wasn’t first on the scene; he didn’t arrive until two hours after the first officers did.
But if you spend most of year building the impression that the cops - the whole LAPD - was racist and all that evidence was faked, nudged or planted… none of those details matter.
Remember also that Simpson had just completed, or was still filming, a role as a Navy SEAL and had a certain amount of ‘training’ in precisely the kind of stealth and knife techniques used in the murders. I think the core of the case is that the silly bastard thought he really was as good as a trained SpecOps type and could pull it off. He wasn’t, and were it not for the taint of fame, he would have been on death row about eight months after the crime.
Those people who are saying this case was all about race, let me ask you a question: do you feel this was a typical outcome for a case in which a black man is accused of killing two white people? That there’s little point in putting black people on trial because juries will always find them innocent? If so, I have a bridge to sell you.
That’s why I say this case was about money not race. OJ Simpson didn’t get acquitted because he was black. He got acquitted because he was rich.
Yep, you nailed it. Especially when the prosecution is too incompetent to rebut claims of planted blood with Simpson’s police interview, where he admits to bleeding all over his car and house that night.
I think it was about race.
OJ was a likable, famous black man, in a period of history in America where social justice for blacks was still lagging (still is), but the media allowed that injustice to be more and move visible and discussed.
So I think it was a convergence of things. OJ was a celebrity, and a black celebrity. It was a huge trial and the jurors knew that, and I think they felt they had a forum to make a statement to the world. And that statement was you can say Rodney King et al. don’t matter, but they do to us. How does injustice in the courts feel to you?
If that was a rich white guy I think he’s convicted.
And let me add this. As much as a middle aged white male can, I understand their frustration. I’m not saying they are bad people. I just think they did a bad thing here.
To me it’s pretty simple. Once the defence team got the senior investigation cop to take the fifth, it became pretty easy to discount anything he testified to.
By accepting the premise asserted by these so-called jury experts, you’re showing your susceptibility to stereotypical thinking. And look at you, twisting yourself in knots trying to make sense of their argument, rather than exercising some critical thought.
The prosecution failed in multiple ways to make its case. Doesn’t have to be any more complicated than that.
I’m now starting to believe NOTHING mattered with that jury. After the Rodney King verdict, there was no way the “white” people were going to win this case too.
Good point about the Navy Seal film in which he picked up some skills to use on Nicole and Goldman.
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And what they ‘could do’, was assign a guy who had one foot out the door, about to lose his pension, to be first on the scene, compromising sufficient evidence to provide reasonable doubt.
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Again, Fuhrman was not first on the scene. And could you describe why you think Fuhrman was about to be dismissed/resign from the police force?
That’s one way of putting it.
Regards,
Shodan
I don’t know. I think many high profiled criminal cases are decided with jury selection. That’s why these consultants get huge money for their services. The jury experts said “black women will benefit an acquittal” and guess what? they were right.
Are stereotypes being used, I’m sure of that. They usually are right on too. Don’t you think?
I still believe this case was not lost because the prosecution sucked, although they obviously could have been better, but rather because this black jury at that time wanted to make a statement. Now that is simple stuff.
I thought the prosecution made its case by DNA and blood and that this was nullified by sheer sleight of hand.
Yeah, because there is no way the acquittal could’ve been made without all those black women, amirite? I mean, it’s not like our judicial system isn’t stacked in favor of defendants, making it very likely OJ would’ve walked regardless of all those black women in the jury box. No, we must assume, that because a jury expert said “black women will benefit an acquittal”, that any resultant acquittals must be in fact due all those black women. The fact that the prosecution did bone-headed things like have OJ try on the glove unnecessarily has nothing to do with anything. Right.
By fixating on the racial and gender makeup on the jury, you reveal your own bias in analyzing this case. Unfortunately, you’re not alone in this bias, since it consumed most of the country at the time. But it’s 2015. I’ma need you to join us in the present.
The defense successfully called into question whether the DNA and blood was evidence strong enough to determine guilt. They did this by pointing to major breeches in chain of custody, and impeaching the credibility of the lead detective that handled this evidence.
This approach was too simple to call sleight of hand.
I don’t think you’re giving them enough credit. Had the prosecution bothered to find pictures of OJ wearing the shoes and had they not presented the case so it lived and died on the DNA and had they not allowed the boneheaded glove stunt, this jury might have rendered a verdict of guilty.
I really don’t think anything the prosecution could have done would have worked, not when the defense was allowed to exercise their nullification strategy.
I’m pretty sure Bugliosi outlined a prosecution strategy he believes would have worked, and let’s face it, there are not many experts at his level - at least not when it’s limited to experts on high-profile criminal trial in LA.
I’m willing to believe a better prosecution team could have convicted Simpson.
But you know what, folks - it’s almost irrelevant now that his trial ended in acquittal. The truth is there for anyone to see, the civil jury saw it, his behavior since has confirmed it… and he lived a decade or more as a ruined man - not broke but no longer wealthy, no career of any kind, no future, his two successful careers essentially forgotten, and now he’s in jail, probably for life or something much like it.
I can let it go.
No, I don’t.
About the 9 blacks that were on the jury, my memory is a little fuzzy, but wasn’t the final jury made up of a good number of alternates? The original jury had some people dismissed right?
Tangential question: Do lawyers have the same voir dire effect on alternate jurors to remove them as they have when picking out an initial jury? Or do they just replace one dismissed juror with the next one on the list without any regard for any side’s preferences?
No, stereotypes usually are not right on.
The trial reflects only on the people involved, not on all black people, all white people, all ex-NFL stars, or anyone else. You’re veering from discussing the trial, to general attacks on an entire ethnic group.
I don’t think you read or dissected my words correctly. I said THAT (particular) jury at THAT (particular) time wanted to make a statement (obviously at that time…right after Rodney King).
I do not see this as a GENERAL attack on an ethnic group. Come to think of it, I don’t see how the word “attack” is relevant either.
OJ may have been found guilty with a different jury composition, this is undeniable, so we are not talking attack here, we are talking facts. Ask the jury selection experts on this case. After they presented their findings to you and recommended that you get as many Black women in the jury (you represent the defense), would you tell them that they are attacking an ethnic group through these findings? I don’t think so.
See the difference?