All right. All right. Next item of business, Miss Clark, are you going to advise the Court or, Mr. Darden, are you going to advise the Court as to which of these exhibits you are going to be withdrawing, additional exhibits?
No. That was on my list to look at. Excuse me, your Honor. The People would move to withdraw 66-A, which is--
All right. 66-A is a computer printout of a diagram of the Simpson residence with red markings.
And 69, which is a transcript of the calls to the Coroner's office by Detective Phillips. I believe that that transcript is just hearsay and it was not capable of authentication in terms of accuracy because they were--the transcript was not prepared by a certified reporter. In fact, there were I think indications even in the testimony to some inaccuracy. And 70, which is a police manual, release of information section, People will withdraw. 102--and with respect to that, the reason for withdrawing it is the witness' testimony is what is in issue and what is important rather than treatises because the witness is not an expert. 102, the letter from Kathleen Bell to Detective Fuhrman, unless and until Miss Bell testifies to authenticate that letter, I don't think that there is a foundation for its admission. It was to the Defense, that letter, as I understand it. People's 124, video taken of the Defendant being handcuffed. People's 144, four-page statement taken by the police of Mr. Kaelin. It's a hearsay document. I do not see the relevance in light of the fact that the witness testified at some length to his recollection of the relevant events in this case. And then I believe that 158 and 159, your Honor, were marked only for motion, but they are crime scene logs for Rockingham and they were not marked for the purpose of admission to the--into evidence before the jury. So I just wanted to point that out. Also, we're also going to withdraw 363, which was the prime time live tape because in its place, we're going to ask to admit--we're asking to admit 363-A, which is the redacted version of the same. And may I have one moment, your Honor?
And I would proffer to the Court again my previous offer, that we can really handle this perhaps better at the conclusion of the case for both sides. I compiled this list this morning in case the Court wanted to address this now. But if the Court would prefer not to. Or Miss Lewis reminded me, without prejudice, we could move to withdraw at a later time, that this is not the final say in terms of what we seek to withdraw.
One difficulty, your Honor, as the Court will soon learn, many if not most of the exhibits which the People may seek to withdraw, the Defense will seek to introduce. Therefore, if there's going to be a document to be withdrawn, we need to know now so that if there's a problem with further foundation or whatever, we can then call those witnesses to lay the proper foundation and not be forced at the very end of the case to have an inadequate record. So there's great prudence and reason for having those choices and decisions made at this point.
Well, my understanding of what just occurred is that Miss Clark is indicating to the Court which Prosecution exhibits they wish to withdraw, and they're giving the Court and Defense the option to either address the issue now or at the conclusion of the case.
But my--since you have these--this list now, you can have the opportunity to look at the exhibits themselves, examine the record yourself to see if there's a sufficient foundation. A couple of these obviously are questionable because of their nature.
As to 69, which is a transcript of the telephone call from Mr. Phillips to the Coroner's office, we would seek to introduce. We do think that the jury does have the benefit as well of the actual tape-recording. We think that there are sufficient guarantees of trustworthiness, such that there can be no reasonable hearsay objection to that document.
Well, Mr. Douglas, my preference at this point would be, this list is to put you and the Court on notice as to what the Prosecution doesn't intend to offer at the conclusion of the case in total.
Your Honor, we would like to move our exhibits into evidence so that we will then know at this point if there is, for example, at this stage a foundational objection, a--an authentation--I'm sorry--an authentication objection at this point as we begin our case. We will then be prepared to combat and to respond to those sorts of objections. Such as foundation or authentication, we will have the witnesses available, and there is I think benefit to the process to have those questions resolved at this point.
Well, your Honor, I guess Mr. Douglas was not here, but we agreed yesterday in chambers that we would not be doing that today, and of course the People relied on that. So--
No. How many exhibits do you have? My recollection is we have a couple hundred Defense exhibits at this point.
Your Honor, we have 224. Can we do it, your Honor, the first available opportunity like on Friday afternoon perhaps?
Can we do it 8:30 Monday morning so that we're not taking time from the jury? I will be here at 8:00 o'clock if the Court pleases.
Well, I don't think at this point the Prosecution is under an obligation to tell you what their objections are.
Well, your Honor, certainly with regard to Prosecution exhibits that they don't wish to introduce, we should then be able to give them notice if you will and to give the Court notice that we seek to introduce them.
And I would like to tell the Court which of those we would like to introduce. May I do that?
Very well. We seek to introduce exhibit 69, 70, exhibit 102. We'll lay the foundation by calling the witness. Exhibit 124 is central to our claim that there was a premature rush to judgment and we seek to introduce that. We think that there has been a proper foundation laid at this point. Exhibit 144, we seek to introduce. I find it curious that the People would even introduce a document which they would believe to be hearsay. We think there has been adequate foundation laid and that is not hearsay if offered by the Defense. Exhibits 158 and 159, there was an adequate foundation laid by Detective Luper. If offered by the Defense, it is not hearsay. We seek to introduce both of those. The crime scene logs were both introduced--
A couple of items, your Honor. With regard to discovery, the Defense of course has given us eight or nine names of individuals they expect to call on Monday.
My recollection is, Mr. Douglas at the beginning of his comments, indicated that he was going to turn over at the first break a number of statements, et cetera, et cetera, to you.
Okay. There is still the three-day rule however. We should be entitled to a list of witnesses beyond Monday at this point. In addition, we have lodged objections to a number of the witnesses that they intend to call on Monday, which I expect will take some time away from the jury to resolve.
Mr. Yochelson just filed it and I do not have the P's and A's here in front of me. But we--
At any event, I suspect that the--that there won't be much testimony taken Monday. I think our objections are well-taken as to some of those individuals. At any event, I would like the witness list for Tuesday and Wednesday and I would like in--the order of witnesses for Monday, which I believe yesterday Mr. Cochran indicated he would provide to me. We also have another issue before Mr. Cochran steps up--
Yes. Your Honor, with regard to this, we have last Wednesday given the Prosecution a list of the witnesses we expected to call. As to the exact order, before we leave today, I'll talk to Mr. Darden about that. First of all, this motion they filed, apparently they haven't looked at their own witness list. Mr. Douglas--if they look at the witness list that they were given on March 1st, 1995, we had the names Mary Collins, Carol O'Connor and Sidney Simpson. They've been given those names back in March. There are no reports regarding those two witnesses. And what I told the Prosecution, for certain of these witnesses, there are absolutely no reports. We've had no investigator talked to them. And I will share with them--we have a rule that we've all agreed upon. Lawyers' notes, we don't turn over, if there's any lawyers' notes or lawyers' reports. And with regard--there are no reports regarding the first two. As to Bender and McKaye, they have apparently interviewed those witnesses themselves. They've interviewed Christian Riechardt. And I can represent to the Court that regarding Arnelle Simpson, Carmelita Durio and Eunice Simpson, there are no reports. Those are the Defendant's mother, Mr. Simpson's mother, his daughter and his sister. And so what the Prosecution would like to do as usual is to get inside our heads and Defense's head. They've been trying to do that from the beginning. And basically, these are witnesses I've given them the witnesses and there are no reports. What else is there to give them at this point? And I think that's fairly clear. As to the order, I'll be glad to give them the order. But these other witnesses, Connor and Collins have been on their list since March. So I've indicated to them that I would speak with them and tell them what I expect the witnesses to go into. This whole idea of a 352 or an offer of proof for every witness is preposterous. I mean, we've been trying cases for a long time. We know what's relevant. And I'm sure your Honor will guide us appropriately. We don't want to delay this trial. We want this case to be over as soon as possible. We don't want to take--I promise you we will not take eight days on the direct examination of any witness. I promise you that. I promise our direct will be much quicker and we'll get this case over. And we don't want to delay with a lot of motions. I mean--and we will give the Prosecution a list that will stand and will not change like every day. And I'd remind the Court that Mr. Darden had given me a list of five domestic discord witnesses like in the morning and later that morning, Miss Clark said, we're not calling any of those witnesses, and I had all my books here and everything. We're going to try to give witnesses, stick by it and go forward. I don't want to have any delays.
All right. So you will provide Mr. Darden with your order of witnesses for those first three--
Yes. I will definitely do that. And further, I will do something I'm not even required to do. I'll talk to him about what I expect the witnesses to generally say, because there are no reports, where there are no reports, with regard to the others.
And as to Christian Riechardt, for someone to stand here and say that Christian Riechardt's testimony is irrelevant and immaterial, Mr. Riechardt is the man who had ended a relationship which he had precipitated with Faye Resnick, who knows about her--the intervention on June 8th. He knows that she moved into Nicole Brown Simpson's residence, that she was so involved with drugs on June 8th that they had to have an intervention and put her in this drug treatment place. He is very relevant with regard to also the events of the 12th. So I don't want to go into all of this, but, your Honor, we are quite aware of what is relevant. And so we have a right to put on--we don't have to put on any case at all. But we choose to put on a case. We don't need their advice. We're not asking them what we should put on. We want to do what's right under the evidence, and I'm sure you'll hold us to that and we'll do that. We want to move through this case. We don't want these delays every minute. We know what's--basically we know what we have to establish, and we'll do that and get out. There's one other thing while I'm here if I might, your Honor. We would like at this time to ask through the People to make Sidney Simpson available for interview. And although we would certainly not want to have to have her testify, there are certain very, very relevant testimony that she has to offer, and I would ask to be able to talk to her, and in the alternative, with Miss Clark, to perhaps enter into a stipulation like we did yesterday with Mrs. Brown that has to do with the remarks that were made at the police station on the early morning hours of June 13th, wherein she indicated that she had heard her mommy talking to her mommy's best friend and was crying after that conversation. And we think that's very relevant and we would like to put on those--we would like to have that conversation with Sidney Simpson and would--hopefully down the road, we can work and obviate the necessity of calling her if at all possible. I'll make every effort to do that if they're willing to do that.
We will make every effort to keep that little girl off the stand because I think that would be a terrible tragedy.
KEY QUOTEMay I quickly refer to just a couple things, your Honor? My exhibit list descriptions are not as sharp as they should be, and with respect to 54 and 66-A, those are just diagrams that may be illustrative. I can see why the Defense would not object. They're probably helpful to both sides. And so I would ask to withdraw my request to withdraw just with respect to those two items.
Your Honor, with regard to the witness list that Mr. Cochran was kind enough to hand to me, this is not our witness list. This is the Defense witness list. As for Mr. Riechardt's testimony, we've provided the Court with a transcript of the interview we did with Christian Riechardt. His testimony in this case is irrelevant. The issue of Faye Resnick is irrelevant to these proceedings. And if Mr. Riechardt has information regarding June 12th, it is information that I do not have, and we are seeking from the Defense an offer of proof. And I think we have every right to an offer of proof. And as far as this practice of interviewing witnesses, not taking notes, not allowing Defense investigators apparently to interview the witnesses, or in the alternative, allowing their investigators to interview witnesses and then not taking notes and not preparing statements is more than objectionable I think. I think that if the Defense is interested in seeking the truth as they claim, so often claim that they are, you would think that they would prepare notes, provide the Prosecution with the discovery that we are due and entitled to. At any event, we have a right to an offer of proof and we insist on that.
They are names that on the witness list as I indicated to the Court and they've been there because--and I know they're on there because each day when we give--when we change the witness list, the press immediately asks us about when we put Sidney Simpson on. So we got a lot of calls around that time, which we don't want to call Sidney Simpson--
Right. No. I just wanted to point that out. But now to your question, your Honor. With regard to those two ladies that you're talking about, I think they're very, very relevant. Without previewing our Defense, which we are not required to do, but--and I'm going to respond to your Honor's question. These are--first of all, let's take the two names--Miss Connor is a lady who attended a I think it was a $25,000 plate dinner and sat at a table just next to Mr. Simpson on the night of June 11th, 1995--1994. She provided a picture that was taken of Mr. Simpson and Paula Barbieri at that particular dinner. It should be very relevant with regard to demeanor. She had been on the list. We don't need a statement from her to know that. And with regard to Mary Collins, Mary Collins--and we think the evidence will show--by the way, she does authenticate a photograph which I think I used back at the opening with regard to Mr. Simpson on that Saturday night the Court will recall. And Mary Collins is a lady who is an interior designer, your Honor, and we expect to call her. Mr. Simpson met with her Tuesday of the week the 12th or actually be the week of June--June 7th. It would be Tuesday, June the 8th I guess it would be or somewhere like that, 7th or 8th. And she's an interior designer. And he at that time met with her and made arrangements to have his entire bedroom redesigned and decorated. It has to do with the events of the week leading up to that--this event. Entirely relevant. As I said, they can't determine our case, your Honor. We determine the case. And I think you're going to find if I stand before you and say we've got relevant witnesses, you know, we're not just making up witnesses.
Mr. Cochran, I understand that. But the problem is, if you have no notes to turn over--
All right. Well, that's I think appropriate, and I would be more than happy to comply with you. But I think the Court should balance that with the fact we will have as we go along many of the witnesses with regard to time and things like that. They know. They've interviewed more than we have. But certain witnesses--and the Court was for a short time on the Defense. It's not necessary to have--we don't have 250 investigators assigned as the Prosecution does and the LAPD. So we have to do a lot of things ourselves over the phone. And some witnesses you don't take statements from because you move on. We've also been in trial, as the Court is aware, since September 26th. Mr. Shapiro's been here since about June 15th or been on this case and I've been involved since July 22nd. So that, you know, some of these things you do by phone and it's not necessary, and my learned colleagues will find that out when they get on the Defense side some day. But, you know, you just move ahead, and we do have memories and we're going to do the right thing. And I'll share with them exactly what these witnesses expect to do when you suggest it's necessary.
Thank you. Good morning, your Honor. We want to make sure the Defense understands we do not have 200 or anywhere near that investigators. And Miss Clark has been working on this case since June 14th. 13th. Sorry. I have since July 21st. Mr. Darden's been here a long time as well. One thing that troubled me--by the way, if I'm considered--and I would be happy to be so considered. If I'm considered a learned colleague of Mr. Cochran's, I'd like him to know I am never going to be doing criminal Defense work. So I guess I won't have the opportunity to find out what he indicated I might find out. But all of that aside, your Honor, this morning, the Defense provided two lists, one that says "Withdrawn witnesses," the other which says "Alphabetized list," and which is presumably the rest of the universe, those witnesses whom they still may be calling. A cursory glance of these lists has already revealed that there are ambiguities which are significant with regard to three potential DNA expert type witnesses, and we would like those cleared up immediately. For example, Dr. John Gerdes, who's been the topic of various discussions, his name appears on neither of the lists of withdrawn witnesses nor on the list of witnesses they may still call.
That's a mistake Mr. Douglas just indicated and that he would be called. There are also two witnesses who are on both lists. They are Dr. Seymour Geisser and Dr. Don Reilly. They're both on the withdrawn list and the list of people they're going to call.
They're both withdrawn? Your Honor, my final comment I want to make is that at this point in this trial, unlike Mr. Cochran's commentary, the Defense is required to preview its case. I just want a reminder that we are operating under reciprocal discovery, and the whole reason for that is to ascertain the truth in a matter. We're not here for the Defense to wait until the last minute to preview their Defense. If this is a search for the truth, they should have no hesitation in immediately setting forth all of their witnesses' statements and what they will be saying.
As to the issue of Connor and Collins, you want to take up the 352 issue Monday morning or--
--we have no bio information about these witnesses, where they live or telephone number or anything. We might like to interview these witnesses. Would you kindly ask the Defense to provide us with the addresses and phone numbers?
We will make every effort to keep that little girl off the stand because I think that would be a terrible tragedy.
This whole idea of a 352 or an offer of proof for every witness is preposterous. I mean, we've been trying cases for a long time. We know what's relevant.
I am never going to be doing criminal Defense work. So I guess I won't have the opportunity to find out what he indicated I might find out.
Well, as you now know, I'm not reluctant to preclude evidence.