All right. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Please be seated. All right. The record should reflect that we have been rejoined by all the members of our jury panel. And Mr. Kelberg, you may complete your cross-examination.
Although I believe that it may take longer because of some video that will be shown in the course of the examination. Doctor, we were talking about Dr. Rosenfeld as the team orthopedic surgeon, correct?
And even in situations where you thought a player had an orthopedic condition and you disagreed with what Dr. Rosenfeld's view was of the situation, it would not be within your field of expertise to diagnose the condition for the purposes of getting the treatment started, right?
My job obviously is to treat all non-orthopedic non-joint and muscle diseases; however, ethically, and this is what the book was all about, when I saw things that I felt were being mistreated, and then obviously the reason I resigned when I saw flagrant medical malpractice or possibly fraud, that he was misrepresentating to the player in an effort to get the player to play, all of those instances I would go behind the scenes and make sure they saw other orthopedic surgeons. So yes, I would act as an orthopedic surgeon in the sense of sending them to a, quote-unquote, legitimate orthopedic surgeon, so I wouldn't just sit back and take his word because he, quote-unquote, had boards in orthopedics and I did not.
Doctor, you didn't act as an orthopedic surgeon in that situation. You acted as a triage doctor who felt there was a problem outside the field of your expertise and you sent the patient to the physician in that field of expertise you thought appropriate; isn't that correct?
Dr.--I guess Mr. Fairtlough is back now, and I need exhibit 507 which I have here. And I will ask Mr. Fairtlough again to put on page 5. This is your initial report dealing with the orthopedic examination and if we can get--Mr. Fairtlough will be on the bottom of the document. So if we can--all right.
Now, doctor, you testified, in response to direct exam by Mr. Shapiro, about range of motion tests. Again, if the Court would permit for the doctor to step down, doctor, would you use me as Mr. Simpson for the purposes of demonstrating what you asked Mr. Simpson to do in order to assess his shoulder range of motion.
And for the record, your Honor--we have to describe what you are doing for the record. Why don't you get back into position, if you would, please, doctor, just before you move it. For the record, your Honor, the doctor has his heft hand resting on my left shoulder, he has his right hand underneath approximately my right wrist and he is starting to elevate my arm upward and he has done so to a position which is approximately parallel to my body as I stand.
We will do it slowly, doctor. You have asked me or you basically put my left arm in a bent position where it is bent at the elbow and my left forearm hand is resting across the midsection of the front of my body, right?
What you have done doctor is with your left hand--you have to get back in position. I can't remember all this. With your left hand on the palm surface of my left hand as you pushed my left forearm and hand back, you have started to turn my left wrist and hand. You are moving it such that it is--well, you describe it.
Trying to keep the hand and the wrist stable. That is basically we are keeping the elbow at ninety degrees. We are just trying to ascertain solely what the internal and external range of motion capabilities are of the shoulder. We are not really trying to affect any other joint.
For the record, your Honor, the doctor has stopped where now my left forearm and hand with the palm facing to the sky is--doctor, would you describe that.
The ninety degree mark here, so in other words, if this is your starting position, we are going about sixty here and going all the way in here, (Indicating).
Starting position would be with my forearm and hand straight out in front of my body so that it is at a ninety degree angle to my chest?
And the first two tests that you have just described, Mr. Simpson, left shoulder, full range of motion?
I think that was the initial screening of his range of motion. We also of course in the neurologic you look for tremor and you then you also get forward flexion of the shoulder which is a separate thing right there.
For the record, you raised your two arms upright where your arms are now at a ninety degree angle to your body, but they are being held out at about the level of the breast?
Now, doctor, in your report, if you will look, you describe about halfway down right knee with slight--not halfway, maybe a third of the way--"Right knee with slight crepitus, inability to flex the last ten degrees." Crepitus, is that a medical term--if I walked and you kind of here creaking of my bones, is crepitus a term that might describe what you are hearing?
It might describe what you are hearing, but you also can--some people just have a snapping of the joint so there may be some confusion there.
Doctor, the next entry down deals--oh, I'm sorry "Inability to next the last ten degrees." Again with the Court's permission could the doctor step down? Doctor, if I have to sit somewhere, I'm going to be the patient again. Could I sit, with the Court's permission, on the edge counsel table?
If I can move my own materials without having it all fall off on ms. Clark. Doctor, I would be in a sitting position?
Basically there is a--you test for extension and then basically you test for flexion.
All right. For the record this is a tough one for me to describe, except by feel, the doctor has got my knee bent in such a position that the lower part of my leg is as close as it is ever probably going to get to the back of my upper leg.
All right. Doctor, would you switch around just so the jurors on the other side of the jury box can see what you are doing.
This exercise flexion, and in relatively flex individuals you can get the heel to touch the buttocks.
There is--well, his heel did touch his buttocks. There is a wide range of normal. It can be--you know, there is tables for what normal individuals are able to flex, but in his situation he basically was, you know, somewhere in this range, (Indicating), which isn't terrible, but isn't normal either, and that is basically where, you know, I'm--you know, you make mental notes to yourself as a doctor and you say 10, 20 degrees less, how accurate is that? You just note that basically they are getting nowhere near their butt, and it is a little bit less than even what some of your stiff patients might be able to do.
In addition, when you put your hand right here and you move, this is where the crepitus comes in. You feel this vibration and that is what I meant by crepitus that he said.
Doctor, before you leave, though, a person who had full flexion would be in what situation? If you will put my leg if it is physically possible--
In other words, you are going to try to resist on me now, is that what I'm doing?
No. I am asking you in doing the test do you ask the patient to try and flex it as far as the patient can?
No, I do not. I do it--I ask them to relax as best they can and then I passively move and try to assess the range of motion.
Basically again what is the best that somebody can do. That is where you have this wide variation of normal, but he was something like this, not severe, (Indicating), but not normal either, and that is all that ten degrees means.
And according to your report, doctor, you said the left knee showed marked crepitation, has anterior posterior laxity, right?
And that there is an inability to flex the last 15 to 20 degrees; is that correct?
And 15 to 20 degrees would be roughly 5 to 10 degrees more in the form of a limitation of the left knee than the right, correct?
That's correct. Again you have to remember when you are in--let's be Frank, you know, you are--you are moving as fast as you can through--these are--a lot of these are crib notes for yourself to try to assess things. It certainly means it is worse than the right. Does it mean 20 degrees or 30 or 15? It is somewhere in that range where it is limited, limited more than the other, but not again stuck at 90 degrees or not stuck at a level that when he walks the toe is going to catch when he tries to swing through in the gait.
Well, doctor, when you are making this report out, you want to be as accurate as possible, don't you, with respect to your evaluation?
There is nothing that presented you from writing down on a piece of paper whatever the limitation of flexion was with respect to either knee, correct?
I want to invite counsel's attention to page again 327 of the real time transcript and ask, doctor, if you gave this as part of your direct examination testimony following questioning by MR. SHAPIRO: "And when you move the knee, the knee should go through a certain range of motion which I can demonstrate, you can see it is a straight 180 degrees when I flex it. There is a different range that everybody--everyone can flex that by nature, by typically it--but typically it goes back to 135 degrees, 140, whatever. He was able to extend--extend his knee. Really he could only flex it to a point where he was limited by 25 to 30 degrees, approximately." Did you testify in part as I have just read, doctor?
And your report says only 15 to 20 degrees, not 25 to 30 degrees; is that correct, doctor?
If you wanted to portray Mr. Simpson in worse condition with respect to that knee and limitation of movement, you would have done so by giving him a greater limitation of flexion, 25 to 30, than what is described in your report as 15 to 10; is that correct?
I was basically talking off the top of my best of recollections and obviously wasn't reading my report when I gave that answer, but my report--
--again a lot of these things are shorthand for what you observe over time in your own practice and these are in my--this is not an orthopedic exam by an orthopedist. An orthopedist looked through all his previous evaluations, often don't get out an exact angle measuring device to detect it, and so it was a rough approximation. Given the time constraints that was, you know, the best that I felt was able to be done.
Doctor, has Mr. Simpson been evaluated at your suggestion by an orthopedist, since June 15th, 1994?
I discussed it with his orthopedist. His--he has no acute reasons to be seen by an orthopedist currently, so no, he has not.
And doctor, you've come in to testify in direct examination about these orthopedic limitations of Mr. Simpson, have you not?
Would you agree it would be more appropriate to have his orthopedist come in and give an opinion on an area within the orthopedist's field of specialty than for you who by your admission is not an orthopedist--
--and who has not done a thorough and complete examination, but rather a throwaway examination to use your term of Friday?
All I can do is report what I saw. I have no ability to have other people come and testify or--
Well, my question was, doctor, wouldn't it be more appropriate to have an orthopedist rather than you, but I won't ask you to pursue that because you said all you can do is come in and testify. Is that what you were doing when you made the suggestion in exhibit 513: "As I previously discussed with Dr. M. Baden, OJ's severe left wrist and arthritis and resultant marked decrease mobility of that joint may have implications for the forensic pathologist"?
When we discussed his medical condition, and I was asked questions by the forensic pathologist that was hired on the case, I responded as honestly as I could, and communicated that in that letter. I didn't really have anything to hide as far as I was concerned.
Well, doctor, if you wanted to have Mr. Simpson's evaluated for his physical capability to murder two human beings and you were concerned that because of limitations from surgeries to his ankle or surgeries to his wrist and arthritis that he may not be capable of murdering these two people, wouldn't it seem logical to have Dr. Jobe, who was his orthopedic surgeon for many years--correct everybody that is correct.
Wouldn't it be logical to have him conduct a thorough evaluation before trial of Mr. Simpson to see where he is today from where he was when Dr. Jobe last saw him?
Dr. Huizenga, wouldn't it be appropriate, if one were concerned about orthopedic limitations of Mr. Simpson to have Dr. Jobe, his orthopedist of many years, examine him before trial, right?
I'm not conducting the Defense. I'm just reporting what I saw when he came to my office and he came to my office because of physical problems and the orthopedic things were things that I observed that you are very interested in, but very frankly, I was less interested in because I had, as I have stated before, two other problems that I felt were more important for his immediate physical health. He had a rheumatologist that was seeing him and the feeling was from a medical standpoint there was nothing to be gained from having an orthopedist see him, either acutely for the one or two days that he was not in custody, or in arrears once he went in jail. There was no acute benefit that he could do to OJ's health. If you want to ask should it have been done for other reasons, I'm not the person to ask that to.
Well, doctor, you recommended to players on the Raiders that they see orthopedists and neurosurgeons for second and third opinions when you thought the need arose, didn't you?
And have you ever suggested--let me go back to your report that is exhibit 507--which says--this is from page 6 and I will ask Mr. Fairtlough to put it back up--under item 10. Which says: "To discuss with ankle specialist when patient's current situation resolved." You wrote that in your report, right, doctor?
His whole life situation which included the fact that, right, he wasn't able to travel, we couldn't get him to specialists that we might otherwise have wanted to because of other life things like going to funerals, et cetera, and we had to evaluate what is urgent on a medical side and what could be handled sometime later. And my opinion was that the orthopedic things, although very vexing, there was nothing acutely to be done and that those things could be handled at some future date.
Doctor, isn't it correct that in assessing the effects of arthritis it is extremely important to look at a patient over a period of time to compare how the patient is today with how the patient was, let's say, a year ago?
And so if the question was--well, let me withdraw that. You told us that the last time Dr. Jobe saw Mr. Simpson was July 13th of 1993, correct?
And as you've testified here in response to direct and cross-examination about Mr. Simpson's condition, you are talking about it on June 15th, 1994, correct?
Do you agree that Dr. Jobe would be in a very good position as an orthopedic surgeon to have evaluated Mr. Simpson around the time of your evaluation to see whether he has shown any progression in any osteoarthritic condition he had existing as of the time of the July, `93, examination?
No, I don't feel that that would be helpful at all. There is only one of two scenarios that happens: Either his osteoarthritis has progressed or it has not. In either instance there would be nothing medically that we would do different other than going after his immediate problems and in addition to which obviously having him see the rheumatologist and see if there were other conditions that could be treated. Osteoarthritis is a chronic degenerative disease, and short of surgery, there is nothing an orthopedist can do other than give pain medications and prescribe rest and physical therapy. Those things were handled. Given the time constraints, given the other things going on, no, I would really have as to disagree with you. I don't think seeing an orthopedist on the 15th would have helped his medical condition. Yes, maybe it would have pertained to some sort of Defense measure, I can't answer to that, but from a medical situation if I had a person that was leaving to Europe on a Friday and presented on a Wednesday as he did, no, I don't think that we would make them change all their work plans and their busy pre-trip schedule to go so an orthopedist. So no, I'm not really sure what you are driving at there.
Well, doctor, first of all, you visited Mr. Simpson as a physician in the jail since his incarceration, haven't you?
And you didn't feel there was anything of an immediacy to his orthopedic condition that required an orthopedist to see him over the next few days at least as of June 15th, right?
And in fact you talk about until his current situation is resolved and that is still not resolved, right?
Is it still your opinion there is no need for him to see an orthopedic surgeon because that situation has not yet been resolved?
The reason he doesn't need to see an orthopedic surgeon now in this phase is he had significant joint problems when I saw him on the 15th. Those problems, if anything, intensified over the first several weeks he was incarcerated. It was felt by his rheumatologist that he had a flare of rheumatoid arthritis. He was put on a rheumatoid arthritis disease modifying drug and his symptoms markedly improved. It was on the basis of that, the fact that his swollen left knee, swollen ankle, his painful wrist, his new onset right wrist ganglion and some of his other complaints resolved that no further orthopedic consultation was felt deemed necessary at that time in the jail.
Doctor, umm, you say that Dr. Maltz, who is the rheumatologist, felt that there was an acute episode of rheumatoid arthritis, but all the clinical laboratory results were negative; isn't that correct?
He felt there was an acute flare based on the fact that you diagnose rheumatoid arthritis on seven criteria, with the aid of biopsies. He had a--a number of those seven criteria that classified him as having rheumatoid arthritis.
And Mr. Simpson had complained all the time of morning stiffness when he gets up, right?
He has had that for quite a time, although he has had severe flares where he is so bad he can't tie his shoes, and essentially is trapped in bed, and he has had at least two significant flares of that nature. This certainly wasn't that bad.
I'm sorry. Any other of the classical symptoms? You said he did not have bilateral, correct?
I didn't say that. I said he had both elbows with fixed flexion contractures which may be seen in rheumatoid arthritis. He had bilateral hand disease. To classify for symmetry they don't necessarily have to be the exact same joint, sometimes different joints on the hand. He had x-ray changes consistent with rheumatoid arthritis. Umm--
I would prefer to leave all that for the rheumatologist. I don't want do pull out x-ray films when they are definitely not my field of expertise. You are asking me what signs were positive and I'm giving them to you, but I'm not saying that I specifically corroborated them with my expertise. These were things that based on x-ray reports, were said to be positive. I mean, I can pull out the reports and read them through with you, but I'm not going to pretend that I am an expert on the erosive changes and the other changes characteristic of rheumatoid arthritis that you don't see in osteoarthritis.
Doctor, what if anything have you done since June 15, 1994, to independently evaluate Mr. Simpson's physical activities over a period of, let's say, three months before June 15th?
Yes. In other words, without taking Mr. Simpson's word for any limitations to see if there was independent evidence to support any claims of limitation?
Again, he never complained to me of limitation other than the fact that I said why are you limping and he said, you know, this is just an ongoing thing, and you know, I can't walk a golf course, but that is after I questioned him. He wasn't complaining to me of joint problems.
My question, doctor, is what, if anything, have you done to independently evaluate any limitations Mr. Simpson may have had over the last three months of his life before June 15th, 1994?
I have heard from other individuals about his difficulty walking, his trouble getting around a golf course. I have requested all his previous medical records, but of course those are not helpful in the last three months.
Incidentally, doctor, have you been provided with any exercise videotapes of Mr. Simpson from late May of 1995?
How was it that you saw that? Was it brought to your attention or had you independently identified that?
Umm, it was basically something that I independently heard about and was curious about.
And doctor, the people you got information from, were these friends of Mr. Simpson's?
Now, have you heard the testimony of the people that the Defendant has called over the last oh, week or so, people such as Mr. Howard Bingham?
Let me read the whole list then. Mr. Gladden, Mr. Norris, Mr. Williams, Mr. Partridge, and also from previous time called by the Prosecution, Allan Park and Mr. Kaelin?
Now, doctor, you said Mr. Simpson limped into your office, and again to use your term, he walked like Tarzan's grandfather; is that correct?
Doctor, I want you to assume that these people I mentioned saw Mr. Simpson on June 12th in Los Angeles or saw him on June 13th in Chicago.
And that these people, to a person, say that they saw no limp on the part of Mr. Simpson--
Doctor, if there have been witnesses called, among the people that I listed, and when asked if they observed any limitation on the part of Mr. Simpson walking, that those people who were asked indicated they saw no such limp, would you accept such testimony as consistent with your findings on June 15th?
And doctor, is it very difficult to identify a person who is limping if you are not a doctor?
Well, there are certainly subtle variations of a limp, and certainly I can tell a limp that someone else at first glance may say they look like they are walking normally, but the limp he had when he came into my office I believe anyone would have been able to identify.
Would you come down, please, with the Court's permission, and in a way where the jurors can see, demonstrate--I'm going to ask you to do this since you are the one who saw it--demonstrate how Mr. Simpson walked in a limp which in your opinion demonstrated that he walked like, again your phrase, Tarzan's grandfather?
Your Honor, I would object. We would--I would have no objection to Mr. Simpson walking and having the doctor describe it.
Doctor, you did observe him in your office on June 15th, 1994, walking; is that correct?
And it was from the way he walked which led you to talk about he walked like Tarzan's grandfather, right?
Again, with the Court's permission I would ask that he be allowed to demonstrate what he saw in the way of a limp of Mr. Simpson.
Doctor, do you believe that you can accurately reenact the manner in which Mr. Simpson walked?
It is very difficult. He had two joints that were bothering him, his ankle and that knee, and he kind of was hunched a little bit. I really--it would be very difficult. I could try, but it would be difficult, and to know exactly the degree, I think it would be a very iffy proposition.
But doctor, in your opinion even though you feel at this time that you cannot demonstrate, that it was clearly something that a lay person would be able to see?
And doctor, assuming that these same witnesses, when asked about any observation of any kind of physical limitation or evidence of distress by Mr. Simpson indicated they saw no such limitation or distress, assuming that that is accurate testimony, would that be inconsistent with what you would expect on June 12th, given your findings of June 15th?
I saw a limp on the 15th. If he had no limp on the 12th, then obviously something has changed in the interval.
Now, doctor, I didn't limit it to limps. I talked about any evidence of discomfort. People can grimace in pain from moving in a way that causes some kind of pain response, right?
Did you see Mr. Simpson evidence any kind of reaction to pain during the course of your June 15th examination?
He had some pain with the movement of his left ankle and left wrist and right--excuse me, right ankle, left knee and left wrist.
And what did you see, if you can describe it, that led you to believe he was demonstrating some kind of distress from whatever testing you were doing in those areas?
Umm, typically you get a reflex--I think everybody has had it when somebody twists your arm back suddenly and unexpectedly, it is very difficult unless you are a movie star, to basically deny pain. And when we did those sorts of things basically again it wasn't earth shattering, but you know, it appeared that, you know, another two or three degrees was--was not going to be all that much fun for the patient. And it is basically another clinical sign that doesn't have a number, doesn't have some kind of blood test that is stamped on a report, but this is an observation that you cull after years of doing that sort of evaluation.
And if you in fact are an advocate for Mr. Simpson, that can even in a subconscious way lead to a bias that influences how you saw what you've just described; isn't that correct, doctor?
Doctor, you said unless you are a Hollywood star something like you can fake the pain?
I was thinking of the Mel Gibson movie Braveheart where, you know, they start withdrawing body organs and he doesn't mutter one yelp. I think that that is again a Hollywood sort of thing and not something that happens in an office, a medical office.
How about a veteran of national football league football? Are those people people who tend to be able to play through pain?
And in fact inviting your attention to page 20 of your book did you write the following: "As Dr. Rosenfeld was rechecking Marcus'"--that is Marcus Allen, is it?
"Neurological status, I was pulled away by a player who walked me over to a teammate sitting on the bench with a grossly deformed and swollen left ring finger. It was obviously dislocated. `it would be nice to get a x-ray before we put that thing back in,' I told the player.
"'doc, this is the NFL,' he replied. `I got to go back in two plays.' "Seeing Rosenfeld still busy with Marcus, I grabbed the lineman's wrist with my left hand, then slowly by firmly pulled the dislocated finger toward me with my right hand. Once I had good traction going, I flexed the finger forward. I felt a pop. The joint was back in place. "'okay, grip,' I said. "'now open your hand. Good.' "As I taped the damaged fourth to the good third finger I repeated, `we are still going to need some x-rays at half time.' "'doc, there is a football game going on. Maybe sometime next week, okay?' "'sometime this after time' I countered. I couldn't get over the fact that he didn't even complain once about the pain. A normal emergency room patient would have been screaming." Did you write that, doctor?
And in fact Mr. Simpson, with eleven years as a leading running back initially on a very poor football team that provided him with something less than tremendous blocking, learned about playing through pain. Isn't that your understanding?
And in fact that even with whatever physical limitations you observed from your throwaway orthopedic examination, to use your term, there was nothing that physically prevented him from murdering these two people as you told use Friday, correct?
If you have the hypothetical where things are stationary, the strength was there to do as you asked me before, hold hair, pull back and move his other extremities.
Doctor, you were asked on Friday if there was anything that you found which prevented Mr. Simpson from being physically capable of murdering Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman. You were asked that question on Friday, weren't you?
Doctor, I want you to assume that there has been testimony from a forensic pathologist, Dr. Lakshmanan Sathyavagiswaran, the chief medical examiner of Los Angeles County, that he has visited the 875 south Bundy scene and in describing the location where Mr. Goldman's body was found and the circumstances surrounding blunt force trauma to the back Mr. Goldman's hands, he testified that Mr. Goldman, in essence, was a caged animal with no place to go. I want you to assume that that is the testimony in part of Dr. Lakshmanan and I will save everybody the last name. Okay? Had you heard that testimony before, doctor?
Now, doctor, you talked about the aerobic condition of Mr. Simpson and aerobic condition is--like marathon runners have incredible aerobic condition, right?
Would it be accurate to say that there are certain professional football players who may not have particularly good aerobic conditioning?
Now, doctor, if one assumes that the murder of Ronald Goldman was a question of power, not a question of aerobics, because Mr. Goldman had nowhere to go to be chased down, how would you describe the power of Mr. Simpson's upper torso?
I would say that he has some difficulties there, specifically the fixed flexion contracture. When you get a boxer, basically your punch is the body and the shoulder, but what you have to do is you have to snap out, you have to snap out your arm, and when you have affixed flexion contracture, imagine a boxer just going like that, (Indicating) You have some problems there. He certainly has power, and I've already described that I thought his motor was, you know, for intensive purposes fairly good, if not absolutely normal. However, that is one defect and the other is his ability to use his hands and the other is if there had to be any bending or any movement of the lower extremity, there could be problems there. Assuming, though, there is--that he is standing in a firm-footed position, then I think that given the difficulties with punching and the difficulties with full motion of that wrist, he would be similar to a man his age of, certainly not a world class athlete, but a man his age he would be average.
I wouldn't hire him to, you know, back me newspaper a bar fight. You know, he isn't that--he isn't as powerful as he looks, but he certainly is as powerful as someone else his stated age.
Basically looking at the flexion contractures of the elbows and the difficulty with the wrist. That is--that is--that is the only point that I'm basing that on.
And doctor, for example, would you describe the condition of Mr. Simpson's upper torso, the chest area, for example--and I will ask Mr. Fairtlough--this is one of the Defense exhibits 1249, the upper torso, the chest, and let me see if I can find the flip side showing the back. Here. I'm not sure if Mr.--well, Mr. Fairtlough, could you make it smaller perhaps and--I think I would rather go by one by one. Let's start with--there we go. Doctor, would you consider Mr. Simpson's upper torso, front and back, to be well-muscled?
That is not true in all instances. Some people have huge muscle builds that work out very, very little. I don't personally fully understand it, but that is not absolutely correct, no.
It is in the realm of possibility, but certainly he has, as I described I think in my exam, a very well-muscled body, certainly above arrange.
Now, doctor, did you ask him to do any kind of exercise to test the power of that upper torso?
A bench press is where you lay on your back, you have a bar resting across the breast area, and you extend your arms in this sort of fashion, (Indicating).
Now, are there other tests that could be done, besides a bench press, that would assess Mr. Simpson's upper torso muscle strength?
I think you could go through every individual muscle and test its strength. What we did in the office is very generally test his gross strength in terms of his deltoids, in terms of the grip, as I said, in terms of the biceps over the range it was able to go and the triceps over the range it was able to go and those were all grossly normal. But we didn't assess his maximal strength, which is maybe one of the questions that you are asking.
That is what I was going to ask you. You did not in fact assess how much strength he really has, right?
Now, doctor, you mentioned punching maneuver. What evidence, if any, do you have that the killer of these two people punched Mr. Goldman?
No, I have no idea what the testimony has been about the incident, so I really can't say. That was just--you asked me what his power was and that is the only area that I know he has some deficiency, but--
Well, for example, doctor, if Mr. Goldman was killed with lethal knife thrusts, we are not talking about a punch, right?
Well, unfortunately, doctor, I think the reason that that is a problem is the copy I was provided does not have on page 1--
So I'm glad you brought it to our attention. Doctor, you have no idea then of the maximum strength in his right hand to thrust the knife that he could hold, in your opinion?
And in your training as a physician and your practice as an internist, physiology is a part of your medical knowledge, is it not?
Sympathetic nervous system is something that comes into play when what is described in medicine, the four F's, happen, and that is fear, fright, flight and mating.
KEY QUOTEWould it be--if somebody were enraged, in an emotional state of rage, that that can stimulate the sympathetic nervous system?
Now, doctor--and that happens without us intentionally saying to yourselves I got to turn on the sympathetic nervous system?
And in fact one of the things that the sympathetic nervous system releases is adrenaline, right?
And from your training and experience as a physician is it correct to say that there are anecdotal incidents reported of people who have very modest strength performing what appear to be superhuman activity when in the throes of an adrenaline rush?
I am aware of several reports of mothers lifting cars and whatnot. I can't verify their authenticity.
Basically those say, for example, the situation of a mother, for example, who is maybe a hundred pounds, ninety pounds, lifting an automobile off of a pinned child, right?
Now, doctor, if Mr. Simpson murdered Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman after being enraged, you would expect that he would be in the throes of an adrenaline rush; is that correct?
And doctor, when professional football players are in a game, the plays last relatively few seconds, do they not?
And after the play is done the players get up, sometimes slowly to conserve energy, right?
Not at all, and they walk back, assuming they are capable of doing so, to their huddle?
Professional football players learn to harness their energies to release them when it counts during the play, right?
And in fact what drives them and enhances their ability is part of the same mechanism that drives an adrenaline rush, correct, the sympathetic nervous system automatically, without asking it to, turning on whatever juices are harnessed in the body?
That turns out not to be case. I think that pre-game jitters is when the sympathetic nervous system is just pumping. Actually you get into a game and you make the first couple hits and the first couple plays and you go into a zone. People aren't jiving up, they are not getting a sympathetic rush before every play. They are getting it pre-game possibly, but no. Once you are a professional, it is like somebody in any other profession, you get really nervous once you are out there and doing your thing pretty much all the adrenaline dies down and you--you are--you are really not under the influence of that sympathetic nervous system.
Well, doctor, what then drives the energy--you would agree, would you not, that the player is operating as a much higher heavily of physiologically when involved in the play, let's say a running back like Mr. Simpson, than when he's walking back to the huddle after the play to find out what's the next play?
And he doesn't have to say to the body I'm turning it on and I'm turning it off; it is a natural aspect of the body's physiological phenomena?
And so, doctor, is it also accurate that in professional football players become comrades of each other and then a player gets traded to another team and they are now adversaries? Happens?
And in fact after a game it is not unusual that after they have been beating their heads against each other that you will see the players put an arm around each other from an opposing team, walk off the field shaking hands, congratulating each other on a good game, right?
They have harnessed whatever rages may drive them during the game to remember their friendships after the game, they are not still going at each other's throats?
Doctor--well, Miss Clark is going to help me. I'm not computer literate so--well, it takes too long to do it that way. Doctor, my question is that from your experience you have found, have you not, that players who have harnessed their energies and gone at each other, for lack of a better term, hammer and tong throughout the game can thereafter control those same urges and act in a perfectly normal and cordial fashion with each other afterwards?
I think NFL football players are probably no difference than lawyers in terms of attacking opponents and then after the event shaking hands and going back to a civil normal life.
I don't think, doctor, you have to risk any concern that I would physically try and attack you. I present a most meek target. Your Honor, this would be an appropriate time to break.
If he had no limp on the 12th, then obviously something has changed in the interval.
Or perhaps Mr. Simpson was faking a limp in your office?
That certainly would be in the differential.
I wouldn't hire him to back me in a bar fight. You know, he isn't that -- he isn't as powerful as he looks, but he certainly is as powerful as someone else his stated age.
Sympathetic nervous system is something that comes into play when what is described in medicine, the four F's, happen, and that is fear, fright, flight and mating.