Dr. Christian Reichardt, OJ Simpson's chiropractor and friend, testified that Simpson called him around 9:00 PM on June 12, 1994 — the night of the murders — and sounded relaxed, jovial, and happy during their roughly 15-minute conversation. The examination was strategically focused on establishing OJ's calm demeanor that evening, though Darden repeatedly objected to hearsay, limiting how much of the call's content could be conveyed.
# 1 MR. COCHRAN: Thank you very kindly, your Honor. We will call Dr. Christian Reichardt.
# 2 THE COURT: All right. Mr. Reichardt, would you come over here and stand by the court reporter, please, and face Mrs. Robertson, the clerk.
Christian Reichardt, called as a witness by the Defendant, was sworn and testified as follows:
# 3 THE CLERK: Please raise your right hand. You do solemnly swear that the testimony you may give in the cause now pending before this court, shall be the truth, the whole truth and nothing but the truth, so help you God.
# 5 THE CLERK: Please have a seat on the witness stand and state and spell your first and last names for the record.
# 6 THE COURT: All right. Sit back and pull the microphone toward you, please. All right. Thank you. Mr. Cochran.
# 7 MR. COCHRAN: Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
THE JURY: Good morning.
DIRECT EXAMINATION BY MR. COCHRAN
# 8 MR. COCHRAN: Good morning, Dr. Reichardt.
# 9 DR. REICHARDT: Good morning.
# 10 MR. COCHRAN: Mr. Reichardt, what is your occupation sir?
# 11 DR. REICHARDT: I'm a doctor of chiropractic.
# 12 MR. COCHRAN: For how long have you been a doctor of chiropractic?
# 13 DR. REICHARDT: I graduated in 1983.
# 14 MR. COCHRAN: Where did you graduate from, sir?
# 15 DR. REICHARDT: National college of chiropractic in Chicago.
# 16 MR. COCHRAN: And did you start to practice thereafter?
# 17 DR. REICHARDT: I practiced for one year in Chicago and then moved to California.
# 18 MR. COCHRAN: And are you presently in the active practice of chiropractic practice here in southern California?
# 19 DR. REICHARDT: Yes, I am.
# 20 MR. COCHRAN: And where are your offices, sir?
# 21 DR. REICHARDT: I have an office in Malibu and another office in Santa Monica.
# 22 MR. COCHRAN: Now, I would like, sir, to direct your attention to the gentleman over to my left here, Mr. Orenthal James Simpson. Are you acquainted with him?
# 23 DR. REICHARDT: Yes, I sure am.
# 24 MR. COCHRAN: Will you tell the ladies and gentlemen of the jury when it was that you first met Mr. Simpson?
# 25 DR. REICHARDT: I met Mr. Simpson in the early summer of 1993.
# 26 MR. COCHRAN: All right. And thereafter did the two of you become friends?
# 27 DR. REICHARDT: Yup, sure did.
# 28 MR. COCHRAN: Would you see him socially?
# 29 DR. REICHARDT: Absolutely.
# 30 MR. COCHRAN: All right. Did there come a time in 1994 that you had occasion to enter into some kind of a business relationship vis-à-vis a video that Mr. Simpson was to be in?
# 31 (No audible response.) # 32 MR. COCHRAN: Did that happen?
# 33 DR. REICHARDT: Yes, it did.
# 34 MR. COCHRAN: When was that, approximately?
# 35 DR. REICHARDT: Well, actually in the later part of `93 we were talking about health care and exercise and then an opportunity came up to do a video for playboy magazine that was about jet lag and health care for the frequent flier and frequent traveler.
# 36 MR. COCHRAN: And this was something that you and Mr. Simpson discussed, putting on a video to aid travelers with regard to jet lag and that sort of thing?
# 37 DR. REICHARDT: Yeah.
# 38 MR. COCHRAN: All right. What role did you play in helping to get this video ready and helping Mr. Simpson in that regard?
# 39 DR. REICHARDT: Umm, I wrote about a sixty-page outline for him talking about nutrition and exercise and things that a traveler could do while they were on the plane, what to eat, what not to eat, things like that. We actually made up a little exercise piece of equipment, a little rubberband that the traveler could take with them in his suitcase to be able to continue a workout program in his hotel room.
# 40 MR. COCHRAN: So you spent a number of hours on this project?
# 41 DR. REICHARDT: I would say about 60, 65 hours.
# 42 MR. COCHRAN: And were you paid for your efforts?
# 43 DR. REICHARDT: I was paid at the moment when the video was--there was agreement made that playboy will go ahead with the video and then I was paid.
# 44 MR. COCHRAN: How much were you paid?
# 45 DR. REICHARDT: I was paid $5,000.
# 46 MR. COCHRAN: So you did a number of hours for $5,000; is that correct?
# 47 DR. REICHARDT: Definitely more hours than I would have made the $5,000 in my practice.
KEY QUOTE # 48 MR. COCHRAN: All right. Now, with regard to that video, have you ever seen that video?
# 49 DR. REICHARDT: No, I haven't.
# 50 MR. COCHRAN: You never saw it afterwards?
# 52 MR. COCHRAN: But the part that you participated in had to do with how one would overcome jet lag and drink water and get up and walk around and things like that?
# 53 DR. REICHARDT: Right.
# 54 MR. COCHRAN: All right. Now, the--your relationship and friendship with Mr. Simpson, did it continue then in 1994?
# 55 DR. REICHARDT: Yes, it did.
# 56 MR. COCHRAN: And specifically I would like to ask you on the date of Sunday, June 12, 1994, did you receive a phone call from Mr. O.J. Simpson in the evening hours of that day?
# 57 DR. REICHARDT: Yes, I did.
# 58 MR. COCHRAN: And can you tell us approximately what time that call was?
# 59 DR. REICHARDT: That was about nine o'clock in the evening.
# 60 MR. COCHRAN: Nine o'clock P.m.?
# 61 DR. REICHARDT: Yeah.
# 62 MR. COCHRAN: All right. Tell us where you were when you received this call?
# 63 DR. REICHARDT: On the couch at home.
# 64 MR. COCHRAN: All right. Were you alone at that point?
# 65 DR. REICHARDT: Yes, I was.
# 66 MR. COCHRAN: Tell us what happened during that phone call.
# 67 DR. REICHARDT: Umm, O.J. called to check up on me and see how I was feeling because he knows--
# 68 MR. DARDEN: Objection. This is hearsay, your Honor.
# 69 THE COURT: Sustained.
# 70 MR. COCHRAN: Let me ask a question. Mr. Simpson called and you of course recognized his voice, did you not?
# 71 DR. REICHARDT: Absolutely.
# 72 MR. COCHRAN: And with regard to the tone of his voice, I want you to describe how Mr. Simpson's voice appeared during this conversation at nine o'clock p.m. on Sunday evening, June 12, 1994.
# 73 MR. DARDEN: Objection, no foundation.
# 74 THE COURT: Overruled. You can answer the question.
# 75 MR. COCHRAN: You may answer.
# 76 DR. REICHARDT: He seemed a little bit more relaxed than in the recent months. He seemed very jovial.
KEY QUOTE # 77 MR. COCHRAN: All right. Do you recall this specifically?
# 78 DR. REICHARDT: Yeah.
# 79 MR. COCHRAN: Did he seem--did he seem downcast or sad at all during this conversation?
# 80 MR. DARDEN: This is leading.
# 81 DR. REICHARDT: Not at all.
# 82 MR. COCHRAN: I'm asking the question. Well, I can ask it another way.
# 83 THE COURT: Yes, you can.
# 84 MR. COCHRAN: Describe for the jury--
# 85 MR. DARDEN: I'm sorry, there is a motion to strike.
# 86 MR. COCHRAN: --how O.J. Simpson seemed to you?
# 88 MR. COCHRAN: Certainly, your Honor.
# 89 THE COURT: That answer is stricken since I sustained the objection as being leading. Ask another question.
# 90 MR. COCHRAN: Thank you.
# 91 MR. COCHRAN: Describe for this jury how Mr. O.J. Simpson seemed, how his voice seemed to you during this conversation at nine o'clock on June 12th?
# 92 DR. REICHARDT: Yeah. Like I said, he seemed more jovial, he seemed relaxed, he was packing his bag to go to Chicago and we were talking about the fact that he was going to--
# 93 THE COURT: Wait, wait, wait, wait. Doctor, please listen very carefully to the question. It was just describe his tone of voice; not what he said.
# 94 DR. REICHARDT: Okay.
# 95 THE COURT: The jury is to disregard what was said.
# 96 MR. COCHRAN: Anything else you can say regarding his voice?
# 97 DR. REICHARDT: Just more relaxed than usual.
# 98 MR. COCHRAN: Okay. How long did this conversation last?
# 99 DR. REICHARDT: I would say about fifteen minutes.
# 100 MR. COCHRAN: All right. So you talked about from 9:00 until about 9:15?
# 101 DR. REICHARDT: Yeah.
# 102 MR. COCHRAN: And during this conversation, without telling us the substance of the conversation, did you and Mr. Simpson make any plans to get together later in that week?
# 103 DR. REICHARDT: Yeah, we talked about--
# 104 MR. DARDEN: This is hearsay as well.
# 105 MR. COCHRAN: That is not hearsay. He can answer that yes or no.
# 107 DR. REICHARDT: Yes.
# 108 MR. COCHRAN: You made some plans?
# 109 DR. REICHARDT: Yeah.
# 110 MR. COCHRAN: What date, if any, were you going to get together after that date?
# 111 MR. DARDEN: Hearsay.
# 112 THE COURT: Overruled. You can answer that question.
# 113 DR. REICHARDT: The following Wednesday.
# 114 MR. COCHRAN: The following Wednesday which would be I guess Wednesday, June 15th, what were you and Mr. Simpson going to do?
# 115 MR. DARDEN: Objection. This is hearsay.
# 116 THE COURT: Overruled.
# 117 MR. COCHRAN: What were you going to do, sir?
# 118 DR. REICHARDT: We were going to go and have dinner.
# 119 MR. COCHRAN: That would have been where, in what city?
# 120 DR. REICHARDT: In L.A. he was going to come back and we were going to have dinner.
# 121 MR. COCHRAN: Now, with regard--you have described for this jury Mr. Simpson's voice of how he sounded, more relaxed and upbeat during this conversation. Did that voice ever change at all during this conversation?
# 122 DR. REICHARDT: No. It was a very friendly, very open, happy conversation.
KEY QUOTE # 123 MR. COCHRAN: It was a happy conversation?
# 124 (No audible response.) # 125 MR. COCHRAN: Is that yes?
# 126 DR. REICHARDT: Yeah.
# 127 MR. COCHRAN: Thank you very kindly, Dr. Reichardt.