Justice, too, has a Sense of Humor - The Rolling OJ Simpson Legal Thread

I am willing to bet that I am currently closer to the Bundy Dr. murder scene than any other ILXor currently.

>.5 miles.

The reemergence of Kato Kaelin as an evening news guest needs to be added to my end-of-civilization poll. Mods?

Also, my secretary (who is a little crazy) thinks that this is the latest attempt by an ongoing conspiracy to catch him doing something.

She has lived in the vicinity of the Brentwood condo for ~15 years.

http://i.l.cnn.net/cnn/2007/US/law/09/19/oj.simpson/art.oj.arraign.pool.jpg

Don't tase me, bro

I'm not sure that tshirt slogan qualifies as "wry."

Invisible handcuffs:

http://highbridnation.com/wordpress/wp-content/uploads/2007/11/oj-017.jpg

http://media3.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/photo/2008/10/02/PH2008100201768.jpg

RIP big man

so funny oj good luck
http://s2.photobucket.com/albums/y49/picturesref/?action=view¤t=psychoj.flv

http://graphics8.nytimes.com/images/2008/12/05/us/simpson.650.11.jpg

xpost ehhhhhhhhhh

Meantime, the price of fame for Lance Ito.

James Cameron is the director of 'Avatar' -- the highest-grossing film in history. But Mr. Cameron hasn't always had a smooth road to movie success. On '60 Minutes' (Sun., 7PM ET on CBS), Cameron discusses his early years in the industry -- including the time a studio tried to cast O.J. Simpson in one of his movies.

After being fired from his first directing job -- on the notorious flop 'Piranha II' -- Cameron had a vision for a new film. This vision literally came to him in a dream; a dream about a skeletal robot rising from a fire. In the end, the film became 'The Terminator,' his first blockbuster success.

But even though Arnold Schwarzenegger became famous in the role, he wasn't the studio's first choice. An executive wanted to cast O.J. Simpson as the killer cyborg from the future. Cameron was completely against the idea, thinking that O.J. would be totally miscast as a killer. Of course, this all took place years before the murders that would make Simpson infamous.

While telling this story, Cameron had to wince at the irony of the whole thing. "I didn't know O.J. Simpson. ... I didn't know that he was gonna go murder his wife later and become the real 'Terminator.'"

"Cameron was completely against the idea, thinking that O.J. would be totally miscast as a killer."

hahahahahahahaha

Wow, the glove making some news.

im fascinated by after the bronco chase, oj arriving home and drinking orange juice; its on his wiki but did it really go down the way its portrayed in American crime story of him verbally requesting his family bring him a glass of oj?? idk it seems so absurd

From a Vulture fact-checking article the other day: “I remember very well that he had orange juice,” Newton laughs. “I couldn’t believe it. I wasn’t there, but once he was back home, he was allowed to compose himself and have a glass of orange juice before submitting himself to arrest. And that’s not uncommon in the effort to cool one of these situations off.”

No need for a link--I guess no one here is interested anymore.

hey guys OJ did it

*Drudge siren*

I wasn't suggesting his guilt was in question.

just waiting for a bills super fan to come on here and tell us that we can't know for certain what happened that night and should reserve judgment and not besmirch the juice's good name

lol

sad lol.

this is weird af

It's bizarre because it's probably a plant, it would be degraded beyond usefulness even if it weren't, he can't be retried, and he's in jail anyway. Unless there's a Trump connection, there's nowhere for the story to go.

there's a thread somewhere on ilx where some posters made a lengthy case for OJ's innocence, didn't find it convincing at the time

When I mentioned to friends I was seeing an eight-hour documentary on O.J. Simpson, two or three seemed at a loss to understand how the story could support such a length. It seemed just as obvious to me that, with some intelligence and a very wide lens, of course it could.

The first three hours, methodically laying out the 30-year backdrop to the murders, are excellent. Rodney King is the immediate prelude, but there's so much more, beginning with O.J.'s time at USC--you get a parallel track of O.J.'s racially ambiguous ascension on one side, Watts and John Carlos and Daryl Gates on the other, and you know already they're on a collision course. The murders and the trial--the next three hours--are very strong. The freak-show elements of the story are minimized (Kato Kaelin, for example, gets barely a mention); the focus is domestic abuse, Fuhrman, and how the case slipped away. I only started to lose a bit of focus during part five, the civil case and O.J.'s bizarre life after that (now that was a freak show).

At 12:30, when the film started, we were told the director would be there afterwards, along with "a very special guest"; "O.J.!" one guy called out, to much laughter. It was Gil Garcetti, who I had mixed feelings about at the time, possibly because he looked vaguely Satanic. He actually spoke thoughtfully about the film and the case. The sportswriter Robert Lipsyte was also there for the Q&A; he gets off what I thought was the funniest line in the film.

Unless there's a Trump connection, there's nowhere for the story to go.

http://i1059.photobucket.com/albums/t427/sayhey1/o.j._zps9k5tclk7.jpg

who else has seen the 4- or 8-hour version?

i have never cared to have an opinion on his guilt or innocence; i ignored the trial as much as i could at the time.

its gonna be on espn this summer, & im planning to not ever watch it

spoiler - hes guilty

wtf

Can a mod get that pls

ok i'll bite - what is this documentary everyone assumes everyone knows about

Its just the fullday chase coverage with an oj commentary track

i bet even the 8-hr version has only 20 seconds of Towering Inferno and Roots

what got modded above?

he did it

just saw the trailer - a lot of v on the level critics like wesley morris are dropping extremely high praise
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=HrB3rOcrJxg

Them, plus me.

i read your post upthread, also has me intrigued.

a.o. scott's review sez it does not handle the domestic violence aspects of the case (and OJ's life) as adroitly as the other major issues - did you think the same? i'm gonna watch it regardless, but seems odd that it'd be a blind spot amid what's supposedly v nuanced material

esp. considering that the primary producer, caroline waterlow, considers it one of the movie's major priorities https://medium.com/@laura_berger/o-j-made-in-america-producer-caroline-waterlow-on-race-marcia-clark-and-domestic-abuse-61eacd3dc19b#.yj6pkiqhl

For me, that's an odd thing to find fault with--I thought domestic violence was one of the film's primary focuses (foci?). The photos, the 911 calls, they're all there--and they make it clear that it had been going on for years, and that the LAPD had looked the other way more than once.

i love oj's childhood friend with the raspy, high voice.

Me too, reminds me a little of Cuba's voice in the FX show

i already cannot remember the details but someone in this was talking abt oj's reaction to something like oj was behaving like a real [blank] or in that moment i thought oj was a [blank] and the broadcast bleeped out the word? anyone know what im talking abt?

is this really ilx's only oj simpson thread?

Justice, too, has a Sense of Humor - The Rolling OJ Simpson Legal Thread
OH NO THEY GOT O.J.!!
No one cares how O.J. "would have done it"?

I know the trial is THE major part of any story on OJ Simpson, but from a purely dramatic viewpoint, it's really not the climax

Fred B wrong as usual

As someone who don't remember anything about the case, which really didn't make sense as a kid in Denmark

i was in high school. we watched his getaway footage while in class. we stopped class to watch the final verdict.

it's impossible to understate how much coverage this trial got. maybe it doesn't seem all that special in an era of 24/7 news, but i feel like this was the first real taste of that, where "informative" news and reality tv intersect.

i think i talked abt this upthread or on the tv show thread maybe

it got a lot of coverage in Australia but I had no context for who OJ was except vaguely knowing he was the actor from Naked Gun

so at the time of the chase it seemed weird that Americans were covering the Bronco "chase" so intensely & then the verdict was all over the news all the time (no 24/7 courtroom coverage but regular updates). I understood that I was *supposed* to be fascinated because of the hype. My friends at college would talk about a lot & I'd nod along but silently I'd be like "ok but I still don't get who this guy is or why it's such a big deal"

it was because there was a big social discussion around police violence esp in LA. one of the best things about this doc is that it places it in the proper historical context. this was a charged and hightened atmosphere. the Rodney King beating was a big deal, there was mass outrage. there were the cries to censor "Cop Killer". it was a US cross cultural event that dealt w race and justice in real time and this doc has plenty of tragic examples. i saw the Rodney King beating video at 11 on the local news and it was very upsetting and the social issues were brought up in school and discussed in social studies classes and the like. even in the south teachers felt it was important to witness a social discussion and conversations around real civil rights being played out in real time. the OJ trial was a nexus of US political, racial, social life in the early 90s. imo the defense used the shitty state and legitimate public grievances towards the LAPD (again, at the time, in historical context, where the trial was strategically held). its fascinating all the angles that both sides throw at each other. also ground-breaking in that multi-media coverage of this type had not really been done aside from the (first) Iraq War and embedded journalism of CNN. the personal and identity politics nature of it was also ground breaking, much to the chagrin of Marcia Clark, who has a good point that it was more about the circus and gossip than the facts. the more things change eh?

most insane part so far was when the one guy breaks down talking bout the LA riots and how the cops were told to not go into the riot area at all and they all stood a block away and watched as a truck driver got killed in the middle of the road in front of them. fucking insane. LA in the 90s was a very charged place.

I'm either the only person watching, or the only person who'll admit to it.

It's bizarre, because they have to confine themselves to this case, and not mention the other one. (One woman on the parole board, pointing to letters for and against release, made brief mention of the murder case.) So when O.J. says he's led a largely "conflict-free" life--or when they ask him about a victim-empathy course he took--your head explodes a bit.

I don't know how long this will go on, so I'll have to duck out. My guess is he's granted parole.

I hope so. God only knows what the real killer has been up to while OJ's been prevented from seeking justice.

i was talking to a coworker at his cubicle this morning and noticed he had OJ's wikipedia page open, now the mystery has been revealed

Paroled. Trump will call.

most of the immed post-verdict reaxtion ftage shd be in the smithsonian, particularly the old woman screaming THE JUICE IS LOOSE HES LOOOOSE

― johnny crunch, Sunday, June 19, 2016 12:55 PM (one year ago) Bookmark Flag Post Permalink

im sure this gif exists, someone pls post it

He went to jail because they couldn't send him in '95, right?

I used to see him at a couple of Coral Gables bars in the early '00s. He had pull with the bartenders, nobody talked to him, kinda pathetic: old dude drinking Bud at a Hillstone's.

Could Trump wipe his slate clean, thus allowing him to run for Congress or president?

he's out. gonna start the stabbing and head chopping again shortly.

Xp to Alfred, he was fairly clearly guilty of the incredibly stupid crime that put him in jail, but there's been plenty of speculation (including from Alan Dershowitz) that he got extra years on his sentence because he got away with it in 95

He went to jail because they couldn't send him in '95, right?

Absolutely, or at least why he got such a severe sentence--nine years, whereas Toobin and everyone else said you'd normally get one or two--one of the many reasons today was so bizarre. There was close to (but not) unanimous agreement on CNN that you had to parole him: excessive sentence, model prisoner, low-level risk. But all of that was mitigated by the fact that there was equally near-unanimous agreement that he was a murderer, and even if you were to overlook that, which the acquittal required the board to do, there was still the domestic abuse that took place before the murders, and how the board curiously didn't mention that (even though they could have--maybe it came up in deliberation).

Weird for me watching CNN, as someone who was glued to the first trial. Toobin was there, of course--he's a mainstay on CNN. They brought back Mark Geragos, who was a regular in '95. No Greta Van Sustren--no explanation necessary. No Gerry Spence--still alive, I see. No Judge Tenner--died in 2008. No Milton Grimes, no Dick Thornburgh, no Roger Cossack, no Robert Philibosian, no Leslie Abramson (all alive--most were on Larry King, the last two on Nightline). I got more of these people in '95 than Trump's CNN entourage last year.

I read that Mark Fuhrman is supposed to be covering it for Fox, too

Yeah--I'm interested in reading a transcript of that, although I don't know that I would have wanted to watch him. I think I hold the pretty standard view of simultaneously believing O.J. guilty and viewing Fuhrman as a creep who may very well have tried to embellish the case. (I did find his brazen please-hate-me interviews in the documentary compelling.)

Fred Goldman has been extremely visible the past 20 years, so I took it for granted he would comment; Christopher Darden has been anything but, so hearing from him is a big surprise.

http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2722773-fred-goldman-christopher-darden-comment-ahead-of-oj-simpsons-parole-hearing

Does OJ still owe money per the civil verdict, or is that paid off/out? Regardless, once he's free he can finally resume his search for the real killer(s).

Interesting what he plans to do to em, given he's out on what you'd imagine are pretty strict conditions.

Does OJ still owe money per the civil verdict

That's why he lives in Florida (and will continue to)--most of his money is protected there, and his NFL pension ($300,000/year) is protected everywhere. I think he still owes almost all of the civil penalty.

Something surreal you would have missed if you didn't watch today: just before the decision was delivered, they had O.J. on an open mic talking with his lawyer. He was deriding some guy--forget the name, and I couldn't tell if it was a writer or another inmate--for spreading lies about him while he was in prison. At one point, he said the guy had accused him of cutting into line in the cafeteria. (Paraphrase) "Cutting into line? This is prison--even Mike Tyson doesn't cut into line."

from a few years ago:

http://www.theonion.com/article/sight-of-oj-simpson-actually-kind-of-comforting-32434

Is it just coincidence that his parole follows two high profile onscreen retellings of his story?

I think they might more likely have been opportune (or inevitable) productions tbf

That's why he lives in Florida (and will continue to)--most of his money is protected there, and his NFL pension ($300,000/year) is protected everywhere. I think he still owes almost all of the civil penalty.

fuckin' florida, the only place on earth which will be improved by disappearing beneath the waves in the coming decades

Is it just coincidence that his parole follows two high profile onscreen retellings of his story?

Good question. You would think that having seen one or both of these (the documentary, especially, which went into the robbery in great detail) would inevitably color one's attitude towards O.J. Maybe the parole board people, knowing the hearing was coming up within a year, either skipped them voluntarily or were advised not to watch them. On a related note, Jeffrey Toobin was on CNN non-stop last night, and multiple times he made disbelieving mention of the parole board guy who was wearing a Kansas City Chiefs tie yesterday.

ESPN had that elfin weasel from the defense team who got a lot of talking-head time in their miniseries (i really wouldn't be inconsolable if he was flattened by a tractor trailer)

fuckin' florida, the only place on earth which will be improved by disappearing beneath the waves in the coming decades

― he tasted like mouth (bizarro gazzara),

hi!

as in so many thing, alfred, you are the exception which proves the rule

you can always seek sanctuary with k-lo and the gang on the national review's cruise ship!

Daily seminars featuring NR's editors and guest speakers;
Two "Night Owl" sessions;
"Break out" policy sessions;
Three revelrous cocktail receptions;
A late-night "smoker" featuring world-class H. Upmann cigars;
Intimate dining on two evenings with a guest speaker or editor.

'intimate dining' with jonah goldberg, resplendent in his formal cargo shorts

Clearly Florida's fate is an advancing coastline that relegates it an island, with Disney/Orlando at the center. Disney/most people prolly cool with that. Atlanta gets to be the new Redneck Riviera. Other swamp people can move to Oklahoma or something.

Alfred excepted, of course. He can stay at the top of Cinderella's Castle and beam, Sauron-style.

The Island of Disney

Never thought I'd watch the mini-series, but a station here was rerunning the whole thing over the weekend, and when I stopped on a few minutes midway, it actually seemed to be well done. So I went and bought a bootlegged DVD this afternoon.

First episode pretty shaky--lots of yelling. The part where Shapiro asks O.J. point blank if he did it; did that actually happen? I thought that question was verboten among criminal defense lawyers, that it was just a distraction to preparing a defense. Or does it vary from lawyer to lawyer?

My #1 Guilty Pleasure on television (which really means Embarrassed Pleasure--such things never actually make me feel guilty) is Pawn Stars, which I always stop on when flipping around. I find some of the items interesting, and the phony pretense of the show kills me--if the bald guy knew even half as much as what's scripted for him, he'd have either won a million dollars on Jeopardy! by now or he'd be a Harvard professor in the I Know Lots About Everything department.

On an episode playing this afternoon, O.J.'s Bronco turned up (A.C.'s Bronco, technically--the one from the chase). I recognized the guy trying to sell it (Mike Gilbert) from the documentary. Obviously the whole thing was scripted; he didn't just show up one day looking to sell it. When asked how he happened to have the Bronco, he explained that he was O.J.'s agent at the time, and he took over ownership when he found out that some outfit was trying to buy it with the intention of using it for tours on the same L.A. freeway where O.J. fled. This was great: he thought that was "classless" and intervened. Line I wanted to hear next: "That's why I'm here today trying to sell it on Pawn Stars to you and your son, a guy named Chumley."

He asked for $1.3 million. The store passed.

wtf lol

I killed her

— O.J. Simpson (@TheReaIOJ32) June 15, 2019

I fuckin knew it

Could someone just please go punch Mark Fuhrman in the face for us?

Is that really OJ's account?

it says right there ‘therealoj’, it’s illegal to impersonate someone on twitter iirc

i’d kill for some pussy RN

— O.J. Simpson (@TheReaIOJ32) June 15, 2019

Even if the account is a fake, I still stand by my first reaction.

I’m amazed how an imposter can say with such 100% accuracy what O.J. is thinking

"If I tweeted this"

I killed her

Spoiler alert!

No one is gonna take OJ seriously after this

the white bronco chase was 25 years ago today

*turns on TV*

I was 10, was so mad that my mom made me go upstairs to bed before it was over for no apparent reason, took me years to realize that she didn't want me to see Nordberg from Naked Gun blow his brains out