📄 Stipulation: American Airlines employees — Wednesday, May 10, 1995
📅 May 10 — Day 71
⚖️ Lance A. Ito
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▲ Day 71 of 167

Stipulation: American Airlines employees

Date: Wednesday, May 10, 1995 • Utterances: 6
The parties reached a stipulation allowing American Airlines employees who are potential witnesses to return to work during the trial. Because CNN plays continuously on flights, these workers had been grounded to comply with the court's order barring non-expert witnesses from watching television. The agreement allows them to fly again so long as they make no conscious effort to watch trial coverage.
1 MS. CLARK:

Your Honor, we have a stipulation concerning the American airlines employees.

2 THE COURT:

Something we can agree upon? By golly, I'll stay and listen to that. All right. Miss Clark.

KEY QUOTE
3 MS. CLARK:

Yes, your Honor. There was an order by the Court and that we--all parties agreed to--that nobody would be allowed to watch--none of our witnesses that were non experts would be allowed to watch television. We have American Airline employees that when they fly, CNN is constantly on. So what they've done is, they've grounded these people for the duration of the trial because they can't avoid CNN. You know, there's nothing they can do about it. They--you know, going off to coffee, there's-- so in order to let American airlines fly and continue in operation, Mr. Cochran has agreed to stipulate that the employees may go back to work and that there will be no objection to their having watched any television that they may see in the course of the flight, and the employees will agree not to make any conscious effort to watch it. In fact, they will try to avoid it as best they can, but we're all aware of the fact that not everything will be avoidable.

4 THE COURT:

All right. Is this agreement acceptable to the Defense?

5 MR. COCHRAN:

Absolutely, your Honor. I've been in touch with Mr. Tom Holiday of Gibson, Dunn and Crutcher that represents American Airlines and we assured them that would apply to any witnesses called, that they'll try to refrain from watching--but we didn't release the extent of your Honor's order. So we certainly don't want to have people grounded because of this. So we agree with that.

6 THE COURT:

A reasonable resolution. All right. Thank you, counsel. We'll stand in recess. 9:00 o'clock.

Temperature

light

Key Quotes (3)

Lance A. Ito
Something we can agree upon? By golly, I'll stay and listen to that.
Ito's wry humor underscores how rare genuine consensus was in this trial.
Marcia Clark
In order to let American airlines fly and continue in operation, Mr. Cochran has agreed to stipulate that the employees may go back to work and that there will be no objection to their having watched any television that they may see in the course of the flight.
Captures the practical absurdity of the court's media-blackout order colliding with the realities of commercial aviation.
Johnnie Cochran
We certainly don't want to have people grounded because of this.
Cochran's cooperative tone here is notable given the adversarial nature of most proceedings.

Notable Exchanges (1)

Marcia ClarkJohnnie CochranLance A. Ito
All three sides cooperated without friction to resolve a logistical absurdity — airline employees grounded because CNN is unavoidable on planes.
collegial

Light Moments (2)

Lance A. Ito
Ito jokes that he'll stick around specifically because the parties have actually agreed on something, a pointed comment on how rare that was.
Marcia Clark
The image of American Airlines being functionally shut down by a televised murder trial's sequestration order is inherently absurd, and the proceeding treats it as such.

Objections

None recorded
Proceeding 6005 • 6 utterances
Criminal Trial
Department 103
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📂 MAY 10, 1995 📄 Stipulation: American Airlines
MAY 10, 1995 KRT DvH TD