I was reading a Chris Rock book in which he talks about what would happen if A videotape showed up of someone else killing Nicole and Ron Goldman. (Chris Rock said that we would have to let Oj get with Nicoles sister, but somehow I don’t see that happening) What would happen if a tape showed up of someone else killing them. Would whatever happened in the civil trial have to be reversed?
Note this is not a debate or anything- Just curious about what would happen.
Nothing would change. OJ’s liabilty for wrongful death in the civil trial is res judicata (latin for “a thing decided”), and can’t be relitigated. OJ would have a cause of action aginst the real killer.
Change that to “might have a cause of action”; I don’t know if he would for certain.
“Res judicata” prevents relitigation of unappealed final judgments, and generally is not affected by a later showing that the judgment was wrong. It’s suppose it’s always possible that the California Supreme Court could create some sort of judicial exception in an extreme case, but as it stands now no current principle in law or equity would allow OJ to relitigate his case.
Some would fawn over OJ and proclaim “they knew it all along”. Most people, IMHO, would not change their opinions at all. He was found guilty in their minds and it is a closed subject, no mater that God himself came down and told them otherwise. Take for example, the Holocaust. There are some detractors who claim this never happened, even with the tons of evidence readily at hand.
I don’t know anything about the law so hang in there with me, If they found something that showed he was completely innocent, why should he still be liable for it?
Think of the principle of double jeopardy. I’m sure you’ve seen it in movies. The government can’t prosecute someone twice for the same crime.
Res Judicata is sorta like that. Okay, legal eagles will quibble, but if you want complete accuracy, re-read pravnik’s post.
Once the trial is over, and all appeals have run, the game is over. You can’t keep on coming up with new evidence and redoing the case. In your hypo, you might think it results in a miscarriage of justice. However, if you think about it, it makes sense. Every time you find a new scrap of paper or a new fingerprint, people would rush back to the courts. That would make an already expensive process become simply a contest of who runs out of money first.
It’s to prevent the endless relitigation of cases. There has to be some finality, a point at which the court says “it’s decided, no more.” Otherwise, one party could keep dragging the other back into court every time it had (or claimed it had) evidence that would have helped its case had it presented it at the first trial.
Of course, the new evidence is almost never a single videotape which completely exonerates the defendant; trial evidence tends to be a complex web of numerous facts that a jury uses to create an inference of what really happened. Courts don’t like to second guess those findings just because something new that might have had a bearing on the original trial turns up.
Note that this doesn’t apply in a criminal trial, the rules are much different.
Deadly Nightlight, I recently asked a similar question. As far as the civil lawsuit goes, maybe this thread will help you.
Peace-DESK
I appreciate the compliment, but I consider it a good day if I hit 60%. 
Now I get the part about the game being over, that makes sense, But in any crime, If there was evidence exonerating the person who was convicted, does that mean it won’t be considered because they have already been convicted? What about those people who were set free because dnba testing came along and proved their innocense? I am so confused.
what is dnba testing, damn you preview!
You would wake up. 
Most of them were freed after a long process of legal appeals which are provided for people in jail. So while there was a verdict, it wasn’t closed in the sense that OJ’s trial is - that process has definitely ended.
Maybe I am reading too much into it then, Because If I was convicted of a crime that I did not do, and then there came HARD evidence that I did not do it, and nothing changed, I would be mightly pissed off.( not that i think Oj didn’t do it, this is a hypothetical situation that I doubt will ever happen)
FYI:
Less than a month ago, “If O.J. was innocent, what happens to the civil lawsuit?”
http://boards.straightdope.com/sdmb/showthread.php?threadid=178831
Besides which, this is not a criminal issue, but a civil one. He was not convicted of any crime (Trial 1). He lost a lawsuit (Trial 2). There’s a big difference, as strange as any intervening reality (i.e., new evidence) might make it seem.
pravnik, can you please clarify something for me? Res judicata does not immunize the real killer from criminal or civil prosecution, because s/he would be a “new” named defendant and therefore not subject to the O.J. decisions, correct? I think that O.J.'s case is already decided, but it can also be decided that so-and-so did it, despite the paradoxical nature of having two mutually exclusive guilty parties.
(This is why we paralegals like to keep you lawyer types around, even though we do all the work–wink wink.)
And of course, the other thing that would happen would be Hell’s First Annual Aero-Suidae Snowball Fight.
Sofa King: it definitely wouldn’t in a criminal trial, and I don’t believe it would in the civil trial. I beleive you’re correct about a “new” named defendant: res judicata bars civil relitigation on claims or issues between the same parties, or parties in privity with the original parties. New parties to the suit shouldn’t be affected.
Deadly Nightlight, I think part of your confusion is that you’re thinking of the OJ civil trial as a “conviction.” OJ wasn’t criminally convicted of anything, he had a civil judgment for wrongful death levied against him. Civil trial and criminal trials are very different; different standards of proof, different penalties applied, different laws, even different parties, i.e. state v. person instead of person v. person. For purposes of a civil trial, the issue of wrongful death is a done deal. Criminal trials are somewhat different.
If it was a criminal case, he would have a course of action to reverse his conviction even if he had exhausted all of his criminal appeals: he could file a petition for writ of habeas corpus in federal court showing actual innocence of the crime itself. A writ of habeas corpus is an “extraordinary writ”, used (in this instance) to bring a person before a court to insure that the person’s imprisonment is not illegal. Since OJ couldn’t be imprisoned as a result of the the civil trial (all they can do is take his money), a writ of habeas corpus wouldn’t do him any good. But new evidence of his innocence can free him from prison, get him a new criminal trial, or reverse his conviction.
SO if this really far out event did happen, The goldmans can keep his money? Thats not cool either LOL
and how can they convict him of wrongful death if in the criminal trial he was not guilty? guess I need law 101