His Name Is Ron

by Kim Goldman

  A short time later Kaelin encountered the defendant in the driveway, ready to leave for the airport to catch his flight to Chicago. Kaelin testified that he helped load luggage into the limousine, but when he offered to pick up one small bag, the defendant stopped him, preferring to handle that piece himself.

  Kaelin testified that he never noticed a cut or injury to the defendant’s hand, either during the trip to McDonald’s or later, as they loaded the limousine, but he did say that he noticed blood drops in the foyer early Monday morning. We knew that would be important because the defense was already posturing about police conspiracy and planted blood. At the time Kaelin noticed the blood spots, the defendant had not yet returned from Chicago and his blood sample had not yet been drawn.

  Throughout Kaelin’s testimony, Simpson was a picture of frustration. He gestured repeatedly with his hands, throwing them up in the air when he heard something that displeased him. He scowled. He rolled his eyes in a show of disbelief. It was very frustrating to see Judge Ito allow this behavior in front of the jury.

  Limousine driver Allan Park was a welcome relief from the hyperkinetic Kato Kaelin. Poised and articulate, he reiterated the information he gave during the preliminary hearing: that he had been ringing the intercom buzzer at the gate of the defendant’s home for several minutes, but no one had answered. About 10:55 P.M. he saw a black person, about six feet tall and weighing about 200 pounds, stride toward the front door. Once the person went inside, Park said, he tried the buzzer again, and this time the defendant answered, apologized for having overslept, and promised to be out in a few minutes.

  Marcia asked the defendant to stand. Without waiting for direction from Judge Ito, the killer quickly scooted his chair back and rose to his feet. He grinned slightly and tugged the buttons of his olive-green suit jacket. Marcia asked whether the defendant resembled the shadowy figure who entered the house and Park replied, “Yes, around that size.”

  Michael believes that tennis probably saved his sanity. During his one season as the high school coach, Ron had taught Michael and the other boys that tennis was a mental as well as a physical game. He stressed the importance of keeping one’s concentration, and Michael had developed a special routine. Prior to each match he went off by himself, knelt in a corner of the court, and silently dedicated the match to Ron. Every serve, every volley was for Ron. He told a friend, “I feel like he’s right there with me, watching me with that trademark smile on his face.” Michael and his doubles partner, David Newman, were nearly unbeatable that year.

  One afternoon as he prepared for a home match, Michael said aloud, “Jeez, Brentwood.” Brentwood High School was not usually on the schedule, but this match had been added months earlier.

  As team captain, Michael introduced all the players before the match. Then he went off by himself for his pregame ritual. He was crouched over, talking to Ron, when the Brentwood players formed a huddle, clasped hands, and shouted in unison, “Free O.J.!”

  Michael could not believe what he had heard. He did not say anything, but he felt dazed. Suddenly he heard his own team respond with a spontaneous cheer of its own, “Kill O.J.!”

  SIXTEEN

  On the day after Ron and Nicole were murdered, sometime after the killer had returned from Chicago and was speaking with police at his Rockingham estate, his longtime friend Robert Kardashian was seen walking away from the grounds with a garment bag. The prosecution wanted to know what was in that bag, and wanted Judge Ito’s permission to call him as a witness.

  We viewed Kardashian as an enigmatic and sinister individual. Kim had a clear opinion of the man: “Slimy. Sleazy. Bottom of the barrel.” He was a key player in several events during the week following the murders. First, he had spirited away the defendant’s garment bag. Later in the week he had driven the murderer back to LAX to retrieve his precious golf clubs. And, it was from Kardashian’s home that the defendant and A. C. Cowlings had fled in a white Ford Bronco.

  In court Kardashian appeared to be like a dental retainer, simply there to take up space. He played no observable role in contributing to the legal defense, but his presence in court was vital to the defense’s strategy to keep him out of the witness stand. Kardashian had not practiced law in years, but shortly after the murders he had reactivated his status as a lawyer. The “Scheme Team” claimed that he was one of them; therefore, he could cite attorney-client privilege and not be forced to testify.

  What was it, we wondered, that Kardashian did not want to tell the jury?

  * * *

  Deputy D.A. Hank Goldberg handled the direct examination of LAPD criminalist Dennis Fung who, along with junior associate Andrea Mazzola, had collected the physical evidence at both the crime scene and the killer’s home. Responding to Hank’s gentle, methodical questioning, Dennis described the trails of blood at both locations. He identified the bloody glove found at Rockingham.

  The information was vital to the case, but questions and answers came in meticulous detail. Dennis paused frequently to look up information in his notes. Bailiffs had to remove one of the spectators for dozing off in court.

  In the D.A.’s office during a break, Kim asked him jokingly, “Dennis, what is your name?”

  He replied, “Let me look it up.”

  The touch of humor was welcome, because Dennis was nervous. Under Judge Ito’s rules, objections could be raised only by the lawyer who would conduct the cross-examination. As Hank had taken Dennis through his testimony, it quickly became apparent that Barry Scheck would do the cross-examination. This made Dennis wary, because Scheck had already exhibited an obnoxious, loud, and tenacious style.

  The cross-examination commenced during Dennis’s second day of testimony. Indeed, Scheck was tough. His voice dripping with sarcasm, he attacked from all sides, sometimes forcing Dennis to admit that not every bit of evidence was collected, or recorded, according to proper procedures. After court that day, Dennis said, “It was grueling.” We all knew that Scheck had only begun his assault.

  The next morning, as we gathered in the D.A.’s office, Dennis was trying to psych himself up for the confrontation, vowing, “I’m going to make him work for his answers. I’m not going to let him get to me.”

  Hank Goldberg, who has a great, dry sense of humor, relieved the tension somewhat by doing an outstanding impersonation of Scheck and some of his made-for-TV attempts at courtroom drama.

  We knew that we could not give Dennis a visible thumbs-up signal, but we wanted to devise some way to show our support. So we came up with a bit of sign language. We told Dennis that if one of us touched our lower lip, it meant “Way to go, you’re doing great.”

  Dennis tried to hold firm. When Scheck delivered one of his extended questions, Dennis sat with his hands in his lap, pausing long and thinking carefully before he answered. At times he spotted Kim touching her lower lip and he showed a hint of a smile. At other times he seemed to grow weak, withering under the extended attack.

  Scheck had an annoying habit of putting words into the witness’s mouth; he would make statements and then ask the witness to verify them. He was able to draw reluctant admissions of errors in protocol, suggesting that Dennis had bungled the record-keeping procedures and, in general, attempting to paint a picture of investigators slogging through the crime scene, spraying blood, hair, and fibers everywhere. Defense lawyers such as Scheck are content to try to make an honest witness look like a liar instead of a fallible human being. From our perspective we could see that, yes, some mistakes were made. But they did not alter the big picture, and it was worrisome to look at this jury and wonder what it might consider to be “reasonable doubt.”

  Day after day, hour after hour, question after question, the defense pounded away at Dennis, pursuing two separate themes, seeking to prove: (1) dozens of investigators conspired to frame the defendant; (2) the investigation was flawed by incompetence. In our opinion, these appeared to be mutually exclusive concepts. The police, the technicians, and the prosecutors woul
d have to be exceptionally competent in order to devise, create, and maintain a phony case. And since the defense argued for both explanations, it was obvious that its actual intent was to (3) confuse the jury.

  Dennis’s testimony highlighted many of the basic absurdities of this trial. During a lunch break Judge Ito retired to his chambers to review a videotape that showed Dennis as he worked at the crime scene. When court reconvened, the judge had to admit that he had inadvertently hit the RECORD button, erasing about five seconds of evidence in the “trial of the century.” At another point Judge Ito squandered ninety minutes of everyone’s time while he considered the defense team’s contention that, because one page of Dennis’s report did not have a staple mark in it, it was evidence of a conspiracy. During a sidebar conference a spectator suddenly began shouting that someone sitting next to him was threatening to hit him; the man, wearing a garish dress and heavy makeup, was a local wacko who called himself “Will B. King.” And Robert Shapiro had to issue an apology for a joke he made outside the courthouse; passing out fortune cookies to reporters, he quipped that they came from a Chinese restaurant called “Hang Fung.”

  This was not a trial. It was theater of the absurd.

  Perhaps an even greater absurdity occurred when, after eight days of testimony, Dennis was finished. He left the stand and shook hands with Chris. Then he stopped at the defense table and, with a smile on his face, said goodbye to the group of lawyers who had attacked him without mercy for more than a week. He shook hands with Cochran and Shapiro. Barry Scheck, the architect of Shapiro’s “Hang Fung” strategy, actually said, “Thank you.” Then, to our utter horror, Dennis reached his hand toward the killer and shook hands with him.

  Whose side are you on? Patti wondered. Are you trying to be polite or are you just stupid? It was a royal slap in the face, and done in full view of the jury. Anything Dennis had said in our favor was instantly negated by this sophomoric show of support for the defense.

  During a break Patti voiced her disgust and surprise to Chris Darden. He simply shrugged his shoulders in mute embarrassment.

  Throughout Dennis’s testimony, another disturbing distraction occurred. The jury had consistently been described as expressionless and difficult to read, and that was certainly true. We were, of course, anxious to know how they were reacting to the evidence. With the dismissal of juror Jeanette Harris on April 5, we got a sobering glimpse.

  Judge Ito dropped Harris from the jury after he was informed that she had once been a victim of domestic violence, and had failed to report that on her jury questionnaire. She was the latest of several jurors to be dismissed, but she was clearly the most outspoken. On the evening of April 5 she gave an interview to KCAL-TV and stated that she was “quite impressed” with the defendant. “He’s gone through a lot,” she said. “Whether he did it or not, he presents a picture of someone who’s dealing with a lot.… He hasn’t been allowed to grieve. He’s got two minor children at home that he’s not allowed to comfort. … He sits there, and it totally amazes me that he’s able to handle it.”

  It was difficult not to throw a rock at the television set.

  Harris told interviewer Pat Harvey that “from day one I didn’t see it as being a fair trial,” and that black and white jurors may be under pressure from their peers to cast their votes along racial lines. She also said that she did not believe Detective Fuhrman and when asked if she thought that someone who made racial slurs was also capable of planting evidence, her response was, “Yes, I do.” At best, she predicted, the case would result in a hung jury.

  Patti said, “There’s too much racial bullshit going on here.” It was clear that Harris had her mind made up before she ever took a seat in the jury box. She was not about to let the evidence dissuade her. The defendant was not guilty and that was that. How people like this end up on a jury is disturbing. Perhaps she should have tried to put herself in our shoes.

  Because Harris made allegations, the judge conducted separate interviews with Harris and with each of the twelve jurors and six remaining alternates.

  Some of the jurors complained about toes being stepped on, occasional pushes, shoves, and hurt feelings. At one point someone whined that the black and white jurors did not like the same movies and that when it came time to choose which movies to watch, the white members were frequently outvoted by their black counterparts. The Sheriff’s Department responded by providing separate movie-viewing rooms. In an attempt to stave off disaster, Judge Ito directed that the deputies be replaced.

  This caused further division. On Friday, April 21, the jurors stamped their collective feet and threw a temper tantrum. It was the 101st day of their sequestration, and they asked Judge Ito to visit them at their hotel so they could explain their anger. Ito refused, and summoned the jurors to the courthouse, where thirteen of them arrived wearing black or dark clothing in an apparent gesture of solidarity. Four others were attired in brightly colored garb in an apparent gesture of defiance. The standoff continued as the offended jurors refused to go back to work.

  We appreciated the fact that sequestration is difficult, but from our perspective, the jury was beginning to sound like a bunch of spoiled brats.

  The trial was in chaos. Speculation ran rampant that this group would never be able to reach a verdict. We were confused and deeply worried because it seemed that, at the very least, this jury was predisposed to taking sides. They were clearly communicating with one another about some aspects of this case.

  We were terrified that a mistrial was in the making. Kim was so nervous that she was sick to her stomach, and she was losing what I thought was a dangerous amount of weight.

  It was a real snake pit. Foremost among our concerns was that if Judge Ito excused the entire jury and a higher court disagreed with him about the legal necessity of doing so, prosecutors would be unable to pursue their case because of the constitutional prohibition against double jeopardy. A killer would walk free.

  One morning, as Patti was attempting to enter the courtroom, she was stopped by a bailiff whom she knew only by his last name, Jex. He pointed to the water bottle peeking out of her purse. “You’re not supposed to have that in there,” he said, in a rude, disrespectful tone. “You better watch it, and you better not drink it.”

  Patti went on the attack. “I can’t believe you’re telling me this,” she said. “I’ve been carrying a water bottle in my purse since the beginning of this trial and I have never taken it out in the courtroom. I will never take it out in the courtroom. The nerve of you to assume that I would do that!”

  Jex stood firm. “Well you’re not supposed to have it in there.”

  “Well, what’s the difference if I’m not going to drink it?”

  “Well, you better not drink it!”

  “Do me a favor,” Patti growled. “Don’t talk to me. I don’t like your tone of voice and for you to think that I would do something I’m not supposed to do in here is insulting to me.” She walked away and never looked back.

  Kim congratulated her for fighting back. “It’s the power of the red hair, Patti!” she quipped. “You’ve got the power!”

  Later, Patti wrote a letter to Judge Ito complaining of the bailiff’s treatment, but never received a response. In and of itself, the incident was not a big deal. But it underscored the question: Where were the priorities?

  As disheartening as Jeanette Harris’s comments were, we took hope in the knowledge that the prosecution had not yet presented the most damning and important part of the case, the physical evidence. So, we tried to be patient.

  Now the prosecution had moved to the core of its case. Greg Matheson, a chief forensic chemist and assistant director at the LAPD laboratory, provided the key point to blast the “incompetence” theory out of the water: If blood samples were contaminated, they might fail to yield any results, but they would not produce false results that implicated the defendant.

  Matheson’s testimony began to forge an incontestable link between the killer and
his victims. He had conducted basic tests of blood types and enzymes; other experts would follow with the results of more sophisticated DNA testing.

  According to this expert, only one out of every two hundred people could have left a specific telltale blood drop at the crime scene; that person was the defendant.

  Referring to blood found on a sock in the defendant’s bedroom, Matheson testified that it could not have come from the defendant; it could have come from Nicole.

  Predictably, the “Scheme Team” spent days attempting to tear down Matheson’s testimony. Defense Attorney Robert Blasier’s questions insinuated that minuscule amounts of blood had been taken from one sample and used to taint others. He questioned the record-keeping abilities and storage procedures of the lab and, in general, attempted to bolster the contention that a multitude of investigators had conspired to frame the defendant.

  Hank Goldberg responded with a touch of sarcasm. On redirect examination, he asked a question that he knew would be disallowed: “Is there any kind of a mechanical device or other device in the evidence processing room that would warn … that someone was approaching and about to enter, maybe a device that might yell out: ‘Warning, someone is about to enter the evidence processing room! All evidence tampering must cease’?”

  Blasier objected and Judge Ito, with a wry shake of his head, sustained the objection, but Hank had made his point.

  On May 5, Kim and I filed a wrongful-death lawsuit, charging that the defendant had “brutally murdered” Ron.

  This was a difficult decision for us. We did not want anyone to perceive that we were trying to make money off the tragedy. After all, we had bitterly resented Sharon when she filed a similar suit so early on. But it was a question of erring on the side of caution. Nearly eleven months had passed since the murders, and the statute of limitations for a wrongful-death case is one year. We could always drop the suit if we chose to, but after the deadline passed we would be prohibited from filing.