📄 Jury procedures and tapes review — Monday, August 14, 1995
Address:
C:\DEPT103\CRIMINAL\1995\AUG\14\JURY-PROCEDURES-AND-TAPES-REVI.DOC
TRIAL
▲ Day 135 of 167

Jury procedures and tapes review

Date: Monday, August 14, 1995 • Utterances: 19
Court returns to open session without the jury for a brief administrative discussion following an in-chambers conference about the Fuhrman tapes. Cochran previews the defense's planned brief on the tapes' relevance, touching on credibility, Fuhrman's personnel record, and his documented 'violent proclivities and racist views.' The session closes with a quick clarification about whether oral argument on the jury view question would be permitted.
1 (The following proceedings were held in open court, out of the presence of the jury:)
2 THE COURT:

All right. Back on the record in the Simpson matter. All parties are again present. The jury is not present. The record should reflect we've had an in chambers conference on the record regarding the alleged tapes and the--well, at this point--

3 MR. SHAPIRO:

The existing tapes.

4 THE COURT:

I haven't seen them yet so in my mind they are still alleged.

5 MR. SHAPIRO:

As an Officer of the Court we can tell you they are not alleged.

KEY QUOTE
6 THE COURT:

All right. Thank you, Mr. Shapiro. And also the conflict issue that has been raised by counsel. All right. Anything else that we need to discuss before we continue with Dr. Rieders?

7 MR. COCHRAN:

May I have a second, your Honor?

8 (Discussion held off the record between Deputy District Attorney and Defense counsel.)
9 MR. COCHRAN:

Your Honor, with regard to this whole matter of the Fuhrman tapes, I can tell you they do in fact exist. We will be preparing, as a proponent of the evidence, a brief for the Court setting forth those things that we think are very relevant, and they are numerous, but we understand the areas that the Court has previously indicated would be relevant. There is one other thing, Judge. There is this overall category of credibility where a witness may have told--said something on the stand we can now disprove. There is also something else these tapes bring to mind, and that is this particular officer's entire personnel record and what is in it, what should have been in it and what this Court may not have seen based upon the numerous incidents he talks about, physical violence and forces involved in this, and so we have a number of things to go back and look at. And then finally, you will recall that when this particular officer tried to get off the LAPD and told about all of his violent proclivities and his racist views, that was discounted by the LAPD who basically said, well, we don't believe you are a racist, we believe you are a liar, and then go back to work.

And the point then becomes some of those thing may now be very relevant by what we have now learned out of his own mouth, so there is a number of issues that we want to kind of focus on and then get back to the Court on as we resolve these and move as quickly as possible.

10 THE COURT:

I realize there is a large circle of items that are potentially included here.

11 MR. COCHRAN:

All right. Thank you, your Honor.

12 THE COURT:

All right. All right. Let's have the jury, please.

13 (Brief pause.)
14 THE COURT:

Mr. Dunne, welcome back.

15 MR. DUNNE:

Thank you, sir.

16 (Brief pause.)
17 MR. COCHRAN:

Your Honor, I have one other question with regard to the argument regarding the jury view. You asked us to put something in writing. Will the Court also allow oral argument on that?

18 THE COURT:

Absolutely.

19 MS. CLARK:

I thought we already resolved that.

KEY QUOTE

Temperature

procedural

Key Quotes (3)

Robert Shapiro
As an Officer of the Court we can tell you they are not alleged.
Shapiro formally asserts the tapes' existence on the record, correcting Ito's hedged language and establishing their authenticity as a point of law.
Johnnie Cochran
When this particular officer tried to get off the LAPD and told about all of his violent proclivities and his racist views, that was discounted by the LAPD who basically said, well, we don't believe you are a racist, we believe you are a liar, and then go back to work.
Cochran previews the defense's most explosive argument: that the LAPD itself had prior knowledge of Fuhrman's character and suppressed or dismissed it.
Marcia Clark
I thought we already resolved that.
Clark's flat, confused response to the jury view question — either genuine miscommunication or frustration at the proceeding's scope creep.

Evidence (2)

Informal
The Fuhrman tapes — audio recordings discussed in chambers, not yet reviewed by the judge
discussed; existence formally affirmed on the record by defense counsel
Informal
Fuhrman's LAPD personnel record, including documented incidents of physical violence and prior fitness-for-duty proceedings
referenced by Cochran as potentially relevant material to be revisited

Notable Exchanges (2)

Lance A. ItoRobert Shapiro
Ito refers to 'alleged tapes'; Shapiro corrects him as an Officer of the Court, asserting they definitively exist.
pointed but collegial
Johnnie CochranLance A. Ito
Cochran outlines the multi-pronged relevance argument for the Fuhrman tapes: witness credibility, personnel record discrepancies, and the LAPD's own documented dismissal of Fuhrman's fitness claims.
strategic

Light Moments (1)

Lance A. Ito
Ito welcomes Dominick Dunne back to court by name — a small, warm aside in an otherwise businesslike session.

Credibility Attacks (1)

⚔ Mark Fuhrman
prior inconsistent statements, personnel record, own recorded statements
Cochran previews using the Fuhrman tapes to disprove trial testimony, expose undisclosed incidents in his personnel file, and highlight that the LAPD itself previously documented — and dismissed — his racist views and violent behavior.

Objections

None recorded
Proceeding 7292 • 19 utterances
Criminal Trial
Department 103
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