All right. Thank you, ladies and gentlemen. Be seated. Let the record reflect that we have been rejoined by all the members of our jury panel. Good morning, ladies and gentlemen.
THE JURY: Good morning.
My apologies to you for the late start, but we had some matters to get out of the way before we actually started the argument with the attorneys; however, we are now ready to commence. We are at that stage where the attorneys will have the opportunity to argue to you. And I should let you know that previously I had contemplated placing a time limit on the lawyers in their arguments. Some of the factors that I considered in whether or not I should place a time limit on them was the quantity of the evidence that was produced, the conflicts in the testimony, and the complexity of the issues that you will have to resolve. And after considering the length of the case and the nature of the evidence, I have decided not to place a time limit on the argument of the attorneys. However, I have placed upon each side a limit of no more than two attorneys may argue to you for this part of the trial. Now, the purpose of the argument by the attorneys is to discuss with you the facts and the evidence that have been presented to you, to discuss the law that I instructed you on earlier. And the attorneys may advance theories based upon the evidence and they may urge conclusions that are fairly drawn from that evidence. However, during the course of their arguments please remember my previous admonition to you, that the comments and argument made to you by the attorneys are not evidence. All right. Having said that, Miss Clark, on behalf of the People, are the Prosecution prepared to proceed with their opening argument?
Finally. I feel like it is has been forever since I talked to you. It kind of has. It is very weird being in the courtroom sitting next to you everyday not getting a chance to talk to you. It is very unnatural. I have to tell you as long as I've been doing this, as many years as I've been doing this, at this moment in the trial I always feel the same. I feel like I want to sit down with you say, "And what do you want to talk about?"
Thank you. I want to sit down and talk to you and tell you, "What do you want to know? What do you want to talk about?" Because that way I don't have to talk about stuff you don't want to hear, stuff that you don't want explained, stuff that you are not interested in, and I can't, and I always have a sense of frustration. So I'm sorry if I say things that you don't need to hear or I explain things that are already clear to you. Please bear with me because I am not a mind reader and I don't know. First I want to take the opportunity to thank you and I want to thank you from the bottom of my heart. You have been through so much. You have made a tremendous sacrifice. You haven't seen your children enough, you haven't seen your family enough, you haven't seen your loved ones enough, and all of this in the name of justice and the service of justice. Your dedication and your selflessness are truly beyond the pale. No one can say that any jury has sacrificed more for the cause of justice than you have, and I want you to know sincerely from my heart I appreciate it. I speak on behalf, I know, of the--of the People of the state of California. This was a tremendous sacrifice. Your selflessness and your devotion will long be remembered by many, and thank you. I think no one can understand how great their sacrifice has been, how terrible the pressure has been, how awful it must be for you to have your lives kind of out of control this way at the mercy of us taking longer than we should have and you having to put your lives aside for longer than you should have had to. I'm sorry for that. I apologize for that. There is only one bright side. Two bright sides. One, it is almost over. No. 2, you have the assurance of knowing that no stone has been left unturned. The Defendant has explored every nook and cranny of the case. We have exhaustively tried to give you every piece of information that could possibly be relevant to answer the question we are here to answer. And in doing so in the exhaustive examination and cross-examination of all of the witnesses in this case and the exhaustive investigation and work that has been done, one thing is clear: This Defendant has received the ultimate in a fair trial. And at least you know that. You have that assurance. Now, in the course of presenting all of this evidence in this trial, just like every trial, some evidence has been presented to you that really is not relevant to answer the core question of who murdered Ron Goldman and Nicole Brown. And it is up to you, the jury, to weed out the distractions, weed out the side shows and determine what evidence is it that really helps me answer this question. And it is kind of like the artist, the sculptor. Somebody went to him and said how do you make an angel? Well, I take a piece of marble and I remove everything that is not an angel. That is what you have to do. It is not easy. It is going to require a lot focus and a lot of determination on your part. Because the side shows may be very interesting, they present very important issues, very serious issues, but issues that really do not relate to who committed these murders. And they should be dealt with outside this courtroom, because here now in this courtroom we are here to decide who murdered Ronald Goldman and Nicole Brown. Now, you as jurors sit as judges of the evidence. You are called the trier of fact. And as such your job is to be neutral and to be impartial as you examine the testimony presented. And in this regard you are guided, just like any Judge, by the law. And the jury instructions that were read to you on Friday is the law that you will apply to the evidence to determine the answers to the question that is posed here, who murdered Ronald Goldman and Nicole Brown.
The instructions discuss a wide range of topics. They talk about guidelines for the determination of credibility of witnesses, both expert and lay witnesses, and they talk about what the People are required to prove to establish the Defendant's guilt, but they go beyond that and they also tell you the frame of mind that you should adopt when you look at all the evidence. And one of the first instructions that was read to you by the Judge on Friday, if you will recall, concerned your duties as a jury and it stated in part: "You must not be influenced by pity for a Defendant or by prejudice against him, you must not be biased against the Defendant because he has been arrested for this offense, charged with a crime or brought to trial." Of course that makes sense. It is logical. And that means that we have to present proof to you. We just don't come in and say it is so. I have to prove it to you with evidence beyond a reasonable doubt, so that makes sense. Now, the instruction goes on to read: "You must not be influenced by mere sentiment, conjecture, sympathy, passion, prejudice, public opinion or public feeling. Both the People and the Defendant have a right to expect that you will conscientiously consider and weigh the evidence, apply the law and reach a just verdict regardless of the consequences." In the course of this trial you have heard some testimony of a very emotional nature. I expect that during the course of argument you are going to be hearing very impassioned speeches,
Firey speeches that may stir up feelings of anger or pity. Although your feelings may be aroused, as may be natural and understandable for all of us, as the instruction tells you as the trier of fact, you, the judges, are to remain neutral and impartial and not be influenced by such passion or sentiment, no matter how sorely tempted you may be to do so. And this applies to both sides, both sides. Although the brutal and callous way in which Ron and Nicole were murdered may understandably make you feel sorry, pity, even anger, it would be wrong to find the Defendant guilty just because you felt sorry for them. On the other hand, although it would be completely understandable if you were to feel angry and disgusted with Mark Fuhrman, as we all are, still it would be wrong to find the Defendant guilty--not guilty just because of that anger and disgust. So as you listen to the arguments of counsel, please remember when you weigh the evidence and you consider all of the evidence, remember that appeal to passion and emotion is an invitation to ignore your responsibility as a juror. To be fair we must examine all of the evidence in a calm and a rational and a logical way. Let me come back to Mark Fuhrman for a minute. Just so it is clear. Did he lie when he testified here in this courtroom saying that he did not use racial epithets in the last ten years? Yes. Is he a racist? Yes. Is he the worse LAPD has to offer? Yes. Do we wish that this person was never hired by LAPD? Yes. Should LAPD have ever hired him? No. Should such a person be a police officer? No. In fact, do we wish there were no such person on the planet? Yes. But the fact that Mark Fuhrman is a racist and lied about it on the witness stand does not mean that we haven't proven the Defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. And it would be a tragedy if with such overwhelming evidence, ladies and gentlemen, as we have presented to you, you found the Defendant not guilty in spite of all that, because of the racist attitudes of one police officer. It is your duty and it would be your challenge to stay focused on the question you were brought here to answer, and the only question that you were brought here to answer, did the Defendant commit these murders? In seeking the answer to this question you look to all of the evidence presented to you by both sides now, by both the People and by the Defense, and you determine what evidence really answers that question. Because the Defense has thrown out many, many other questions. They have thrown out questions about whether LAPD has some bad police officers, does the scientific division have some sloppy criminalists, did the Coroner's office have some sloppy Coroners? And the answer to all these questions is sure, yes, they do. That is not news to you. I'm sure it wasn't a big surprise to you. But those are not--they are important issues. You know, we should look into the quality control, things should be done better, things could always be done better in every case at every time. There is no question about that. We are not here to vote on that today. The question is what the evidence that was presented to you that relates to who killed Ron and Nicole, what does that tell you? Does that convince you beyond a reasonable doubt? No matter how much more qualified or how much better they could have done their job, still and all, did they present enough evidence to you, did the evidence come to you in sufficient quantity and convincing force to convince you that the Defendant committed these murders beyond a reasonable doubt? Ladies and gentlemen, I submit to you that we have more than met our burden in this case. Now, the Defense has thrown out a lot of possibilities to you, the merest of possibilities, and a lot of them were just there to scare you. You heard Dr. Gerdes talk about it could be this, it could have been that. I see the validation studies, you know, kind of like reminds me of a doctor, when you have to go in for an operation, they give you all this list of things that could possibly happen to you, could possibly happen to you. Nevertheless, they have to give you that warning, right? They got to tell you that because otherwise you cannot give an informed consent and say, yes, knowing the risk, I'm going to go and do this. Now, if you really believed that all these horrible things were going to happen, no one would have an operation. You wouldn't take the risk. But you know, they have got to tell me everything no matter how remote the possibility, and indeed you go and have the operation and you are fine and none of that stuff happens. Well, in this case it is actually they have raised all the possibilities of things that could happen in an effort to scare you away from the evidence, but we have done better than you could ever do in an operation, because we have proven to you that nothing in this case did happen. We have proven to you that it was not contaminated. We have even proven to you that it was not planted, for lack of a better term. And I'm going to go through the evidence and demonstrate how we have proven that to you.
So why were these issues raised? Why were these questions raised? Well, they are all questions and issues that were raised as a distraction. They were roads raised, roads created by the Defendant to lead you away from the core truth and the issue that we are searching for the answer to, which is who murdered Ron and Nicole? But these roads, ladies and gentlemen, these are false roads. They are false roads because they lead to a dead-end. The false roads were paved with inflammatory distractions. But even after all their tireless efforts, the evidence stands strong and powerful to prove to you the Defendant's guilt. Now, I would like to show you a jury instruction that is very important. I think that both the Prosecution and the Defense will agree.
Thank you, your Honor. Reasonable doubt. Okay. This is an instruction that we will talk to you about, they are going to talk to you about. This is a real important instruction. It is at the real heart of a case, every case, every criminal case. Because it is the burden of proof that the People have. We don't guess anybody guilty. We prove it beyond a reasonable doubt, which is what we've done in this case. Now, to tell you about reasonable doubt, it is kind of a funny definition because it talks to you about reasonable doubt in very negative terms. It says: "That state of the evidence which, after the entire comparison, you cannot say that you have an abiding conviction."
It is very weirdly worded and it is going to take you a while to go through this, so I'm going to go through it pieces at a time to try and give you a little hand here. First of all, let me point out the first paragraph talks about the fact that it is our burden of proof. I think that one is fine. That is pretty easy. Now, it talks about how reasonable doubt is defined. This is real important. "It is not a mere possible doubt," okay, "Because everything relating to human affairs is open to some possible or imaginary doubt." That is very important. It is a doubt founded in reason. I'm going to amplify more on that with examples when we talk about the actual evidence in this case, but bear that in mind, a possible doubt. I have a possible doubt that the sun will come up tomorrow. Do I have a reasonable doubt about it? No. I have no doubt founded in reason that that is going to happen, just for a very basic example, so think about that, too. We are not talking about what possible doubt is. It is reasonable doubt. Now, the other part of it: "It is that state of the case which after the entire comparison, the entire comparison and consideration of all of the evidence." Now, what that means, ladies and gentlemen, is you consider the Defense case and you consider the Prosecution case. You consider all of it. You will probably hear from the Defense, multiple times, "We don't have to prove anything." That is right. They don't. In every criminal case when the People complete their presentation, the Defense can say no witnesses, we rest, because they can sit and make the state prove their case without ever calling a witness. That's right. That's correct. But when they do, when they do, then you must consider the quality and the nature of the evidence that they have presented. That goes into the mix. That is part of your consideration. What kind of evidence did they present to demonstrate something to you? To prove something to you?
If they try to prove something to you, their witnesses, their evidence gets evaluated by the same rules ours do. The same jury instruction applies. You will see a jury instruction in your packet back there that talks about how to evaluate the credibility of witnesses, both expert and lay witnesses. There is no distinction made in that jury instruction for Defense witnesses or for People's witnesses. It is all the same. You determine their credibility and the relative convincing force of the proof in--by the same rules, okay? So that is the first thing to remember. When you look at everything, you look at all of the evidence. What have they shown you? What have we shown you? We have the burden of proof. But you look at what they have shown you when you want to consider what was proven to you. We have pieces of boards and exhibits everywhere in this courtroom. All right. Now, all I'm telling you, ladies and gentlemen, is it is a reasonable doubt and it is not possible doubt and we will come back to it again.
But at the conclusion of all of our arguments, when you open up the windows and let the cool air blow out the smokescreen that has been created by the Defense with the cool wind of reason, you will see that the Defendant has been proven guilty easily beyond a reasonable doubt. Or to put it another way: The evidence has conclusively proven that when Detective Mark Fuhrman said he did not use racial epithets in the last ten years, he lied, but it is also conclusively proven that the Defendant is guilty beyond a reasonable doubt. Now, I would like to start with the evidence in this case with the timing, okay? I think that is the easiest place to start, the timing on June the 12th. Let's begin with a very brief review of the movements of Ron and Nicole, and we are going to start with the recital in the late afternoon. I'm sure you recall that recital for Sydney at Paul Revere high school. Nicole left the recital and went to the Mezzaluna near her home, along with her parents and friends and her children, Sydney and Justin, and she arrived at the Mezzaluna approximately 6:30 p.m. Ron Goldman, who was an acquaintance of hers, a waiter at the Mezzaluna, was working that night but did not wait on her table. And when Nicole and her family left between 8:30 and 9:00, they didn't know that the simple act of dropping a pair of glasses would have the tragic consequences that we all know now that it did. Now, you recall at the end of the People's case there was a stipulation that we entered into and you recall that the Judge has told that you a stipulation is to be accepted by you as an undisputed fact. And the stipulation told you the following: After leaving the Mezzaluna that night Nicole's mother called the Mezzaluna to ask about her glasses. That was at 9:37. Karen Crawford, the bartender and Sunday night manager of the Mezzaluna, took the call and went out to look for the glasses. She found them outside near where Nicole had pulled up in front of the restaurant, and at Mrs. Brown's request she put the glasses into an envelope on which she wrote--I believe she wrote "Nicole Simpson will pick up Monday." That call lasted two minutes. It was also stipulated that at 9:40 p.m. Mrs. Brown called her daughter, Nicole, and they spoke for two minutes, and in that last conversation before her death Nicole promised her mother that she would arrange to pick up the glasses.
Now, those two conversations with Nicole's mother were a matter of stipulation. That is an undisputed fact. Karen Crawford testified that at about five minutes after speaking to Nicole's mother she got a call from Nicole. That would mean Nicole called her at about 9:43. Nicole asked to speak to Ron. He took the phone, and after they--Ron spoke to her, he asked Karen for the glasses and she gave him that envelope containing the glasses. At about 9:50, ten of 10:00 that night, Ronald Goldman left the Mezzaluna restaurant. When he left he was wearing the white shirt and dark pants that were part of his waiter's uniform and that uniform was later found by his sister, Kim Goldman, in his apartment draped over the bedroom door. That uniform is here in evidence. So we know that Ron went home and changed clothes after he left the Mezzaluna at about 9:50. The other waitress in the restaurant, Tia Gavin, testified that it takes about a minute to walk from the Mezzaluna to his apartment. So even being a little generous, he got home by about 9:52, say. He changed, he freshened up, because we know he wasn't wearing that waiter's uniform when he was found, and so it would be reasonable to infer that he got to Nicole's house with the envelope sometime shortly after 10:00. And when I say sometime shortly after 10:00, we don't know exactly what time, and I'm not saying that we do, but 10:10 or so would seem a reasonable amount of time to get freshened up, changed, get over there, based on what we do know. Now, that brings me to something else that I want to point out. In the case, as in every case, there is certain evidence that is introduced that is directly proving a fact. For example, in this case, Ron Goldman left Mezzaluna at approximately 9:50. That is approximate time. It could have been a few minutes later. So we know that sometime before 10:00 he left. We know he changed clothes, okay? But the direct thing we know is that sometime shortly before 10:00 he left. We know he changed clothes because he was wearing something different when he was found. We know how long it takes for him to get home, because we have a witness telling us that, but what we don't know is exactly what time he left his house. We know he left his house in time to be murdered, and we will talk about that shortly, and in time for him to be there with the dogs barking.
We have to make inferences, okay? We have to make an inference from the evidence that we know about as to when he got to Bundy. Now, you can draw an inference that is reasonable or you can draw an inference that is unreasonable. What we are required to do here and what I must do is draw inferences, excuse me, that are reasonable. Based on what we know, when he left the Mezzaluna, changing clothes, freshening up, and I think Stewart Tanner testified that he was--they had plans to meet at the Baja Cantina, he was going to get cleaned up to go somewhere. It is reasonable then to infer that he took ten minutes or so to do that, change clothes, freshen up and then go over to Bundy. Now, the dogs--excuse me--the witnesses that testified to the dogs. As you may recall, we heard from a number of them and they were neighbors of Nicole. Now, as for the people that the Prosecution presented on this issue, all of these people were people who lived very close by. All of them were people who were home on that night and all of these were people who were not distracted by anything else going on at the time. And all of these were people who did not seek out involvement in this case. All of these were people who were found by the police during normal police procedures as they went knocking around the neighborhood doors to find out if anybody heard or saw anything. And some of these people were disturbed by the police at 2:30 in the morning, at 5:00 in the morning, and these people just were--were summoned by the police to tell what they heard, what they saw. They didn't go out looking for their 15 minutes of fame. They didn't go calling the police and running after the detectives to try and tell them they knew something important so they could be on TV and become the latest sensation. These people were called upon by the police because they were--they were there, they were near her, they were close to the condominium, they were within range where they might have seen or heard something, and so they were contacted. And so they were subpoenaed. They didn't ask to be involved. And that is a big distinction between our witnesses and the witnesses called by the Defense on this issue. Now, the significance of the barking dog is obviously that it tells us roughly when the murders occurred. Not exactly, but it is reasonable to infer again, reasonable inference, that the murders occurred either shortly before or during the time when the dog was barking. Now, the neighbors who testified to this said that they had not heard a dog barking so insistently like that before. It really drew their attention. That is why they remembered it. That is why it woke them up or disturbed them or made them concerned, made them look out their windows to see what was going on, because it was unusual. Which means that Nicole was not in the habit of letting her dog run around like that, which means that if that dog is barking like this and she is not tending to it, she is already dead. Now, what did they say? The witnesses that we presented were very consistent in this regard. I'm going to show you--
All right. Mr. Escobar, would you just briefly display that to Defense counsel so they know which one it is we are looking at.
And we may have a problem with the court reporter. I just had them show it to you, counsel.
For those of you who aren't going to be able see it so well for now, we will move it back down in just a little bit.
All right. Now, I'm going to direct your attention down here, (Indicating), okay? The first witness that we called was named Pablo Fenjves. You may recall that he testified he was in his apartment on that night and at approximately 10:15 to 10:20 he heard the insistent barking of a dog. He called it a plaintive wail. And the nature and sound of the barking that he heard make it sound to him like it was a dog in trouble. Like something traumatic had occurred and it drew his attention, made him think about what was happening and he noticed it. He noticed it and he noticed the time because he had been watching the news, so he tied the time to that event and he testified it was between 10:15 and 10:20, approximately, that he heard that. You recall also, and you see he is right here on the timeline, Mark Storfer testified as well. Let me back up. I'm sorry. Pablo Fenjves was the one who lived behind the condominium, diagonally behind Nicole Brown, across the alley if you will recall. His windows--that he had windows that faced the alley. And at one point I think he pointed out where he was able to see and he indicated that the barking seemed to come from the location of Nicole's condo, so he lived right behind her. The other witness who testified was Mark Storfer. Mark Storfer lived down on Dorothy. That would have been just south of Nicole's condominium. Mr. Fairtlough, do we have the dog board that we had showed with the witnesses where they lived? Is that down here? I will get it. That's fine. That's fine.
I'm going to get that board out. We used it during the presentation of the testimony. I think it really makes it a lot easier to remember the locations and figure out where people are in relation to each other, if you can see that board, and then I won't have do explain so much.
Thank you. All right. Here, the red house here that I'm pointing to is Nicole Brown's house. This purple house right here south on Dorothy, that is Mark Storfer's house. And he testified, if you may recall, that he was just putting his little son to bed when he heard the dog barking and he was concerned and it drew his attention because he was worried that the dog was going to wake up his son, you know. I think a lot of us know what that is like. You finally get the baby to bed and then something wakes it up horrible. That is what happened to. So he was very cognizant, very aware of the fact that dog was barking and it was disturbing him. He went upstairs, and he said approximately two to three minutes after he heard the dog start to bark, went up and looked at his clock because he was concerned how late the hour was and why the barking was so loud at that late hour. He looked and he looked at his clock and it said 10:28. Now, he said they always keep their clocks five minutes fast, so his clock--this gets complicated--really said 10:23 since he heard the dog start barking two to three minutes before he looked at the clock. It was approximately 10:20 to 10:21. Now, he also lived very close. And what is important for you to know and recall about his testimony is that when the dog started barking he indicated that he looked--let's see. He indicated that he looked out his window at 10:23. A few minutes after the dog started barking he went to see what was going on and the source of the noise seemed to come from north of--of him on Bundy, which is of course the direction of Nicole's house. And when he looked out the window at 10:23 he saw no one walking down the street. That is real important. I would like to ask you to try and remember that fact. Mr. Darden will discuss how significant that is when he speaks to you later. We also heard from Eva Stein and Louis Karpf. They were the next door neighbors of Nicole Brown. This is the blue house here. They lived right next door. Now, on that night Eva Stein had gone to bed shortly before ten o'clock and at some point she indicated shortly after she fell asleep she was awakened by the loud insistent barking of a dog or she thought it might have been even more than one dog because it was so loud. She indicated that shortly after that, approximately half hour later, after she started to hear the barking dog, her boyfriend, Louis Karpf, came up and she could tell that he came home because she heard the bell, so an hour after she heard the dog barking he came home. And Louis Karpf told you he came home at 10:45, 10:50 at the latest, which means she heard the dog barking also at 10:15 to 10:20. And just to remind you, Pablo Fenjves' house is the yellow one indicated here on the board, so just across the alley behind Miss Brown's condo.
All right. Now, Louis Karpf also told you something else. He told you that when he came home he went into his garage and then he went out in front to get the mail. And when he went out in front to get the mail, he saw a dog in the street and this was the time he indicated that he got home. When he got outside he saw a dog running around in the street barking insistently, a dog that he identified for you as Kato, Nicole's dog. The dog was--was prancing around in the street and acting in a very weird manner. And Mr. Karpf was a little afraid of him and went back inside. Now, Mr. Karpf also told you that he saw a man walking a dog. Steve Schwab told you that at about 10:30 he left his home and went out and took his dog for a walk. If you recall, he said that he waited to see the end of the Dick van Dyke show and then went out to walk his dog, that it was about a little after 10:00.
He told you of the route that he took walking around the neighborhood and he told you that at approximately 10:55 he saw Kato, Nicole's dog, at the corner of Dorothy and Bundy. And he told you that the dog was acting very strangely, so he went over to look at the dog, and when he did, he noticed that the dog had blood on his back paw and the blood appeared to be moist. He crossed over to the east side of Bundy where he said the lighting was better. In other words, saying to you that the side of the street that Nicole lived on was poorly lit. Now, he noticed that the dog's paws had blood on it, but he did not testify that he saw any paw prints on the sidewalk. Does that mean that they weren't there? No. It means he didn't notice them. Obviously if the dog had blood on its paw and it was--it had gone out of Nicole's home and it had walked down the sidewalk, there were paw prints there to be seen. The fact that someone doesn't see something doesn't mean it isn't there; it means they didn't see it. That is what I mean by reasonable inferences to be drawn from the evidence. Now, when he crossed over to the east side of Bundy where they had more light, the dog stayed with Steve, stayed, and they continued to walk, but as they walked, at each house that they--that there was a pathway, the dog stopped and barked looking up the pathway. This dog was acting very strangely. Obviously it had seen a very traumatic event. Whether it simply--whether it actually witnessed the murders or simply came up on the bloody aftermath, it is clear the dog saw something. Now, when Steve got home he took the dog into his courtyard and he was able to see that there was blood on the underside of the belly and there was blood on all four paws, but the dog was not injured. Now, Steve's friend, Sukru Boztepe, if you recall, he was the one found who found the bodies. Sukru agreed to take the dog from Steve for the record the night. And you recall that when he took him to his apartment the dog was acting so agitated and so nervous that he had to take it out for a walk and he decided to let it lead him, perhaps let it lead him to where he lived. And the dog did lead him. The dog pulled, the dog pulled and they went south on Bundy. The dog pulled harder and harder and they walked south on Bundy towards Nicole's home. When it got to the pathway that led up to Nicole's house, the dog stopped and it looked up the pathway and Sukru told you that had the dog not done that, he would not have looked up the pathway and he would not have seen what he saw. But as it was, he did, and because he followed that dog's gaze, he saw a sight, probably the most horrifying one ever seen in one's life or ever will see. Now, Sukru told you that when he saw Nicole Brown lying on the ground it was midnight, so we know that the murders occurred after 10:00 and before midnight. That is the window that we know we have, just based on what people observed and what people saw. Now, I would like to turn to the Defendant's activity for that night and I'm going to show you how during the time period preceding the barking, during the barking and for half an hour after the barking, the Defendant's whereabouts are unaccounted for. Let's start with Kato. Kato was a necessary witness for to us call, but he was by no means a witness who was happy to testify for the Prosecution, as you could tell. This was the Defendant's houseguest, someone who started out as Nicole's friend and border who found a better deal, certainly a cheaper deal, at the Defendant's estate.
You will recall that he met Nicole after her divorce back in 1992 in aspen and when he went to a party at her house on Gretna Green in--during 1993 or the end of 1992, he asked if could he rent the guest house on that property and she agreed. And they made an arrangement that he would pay monthly rent and reduce that monthly rent to some extent by performing baby-sitting activity for her two children. Now, he lived there with her on Gretna Green for almost a year filling in as baby-sitter for the children, a friend to her and the children as well. But when Nicole moved in January of 1994 to Bundy, there was no separate home for him to live in, no separate guest house, and the Defendant asked him not to go and move in with her and he persuaded Kato to go and live with him at Rockingham for free. That was a very good deal for Kato, and as you may recall, I even asked him how much money did that save you, you know, to stay? A place like the Defendant offered him, with the availability of the pool and the Jacuzzi, tennis court, living on that estate in kind of like a studio apartment, probably would have cost him 600 a month. What did he say? I think we wound up estimating that the total amount of money he saved staying there for free was about $6,000. He was very indebted to the Defendant. And the aspiring, but none to successful at that point, actor, Kato saw also a career-wise move that was very good for him because in the Defendant could he have a connection. Get the picture here? Logically speaking, this man is indebted to Mr. Simpson. And he was not a happy camper to be a Prosecution witness. He certainly didn't want to come in here and give testimony that might prove damaging to him. And you could tell from his demeanor, I'm sure, that he was not about to volunteer anything he didn't absolutely have to tell us, until he was cornered. I don't know whether you remember it now, it has really been a very long time, but during his testimony I brought out the fact that at the grand jury proceedings back in June of `94, I asked him whether he had ever witnessed any fights between the Defendant and Nicole, and when he was asked in front of the grand jury whether he ever remembered seeing them fight, he answered that he remembered only one. And I asked him do you remember anything about the nature of that fight? And he said no, only that it was one. Only that it was one. And then when he came into court here, ladies and gentlemen, when I asked him why he didn't bring--we asked him what he meant by that one fight that he had witnessed? That was the 1993 call to Gretna Green that you heard on tape when Nicole Brown called 911 and the Defendant was standing outside screaming, yelling obscenities at her and broke the door down and she was afraid for her life. That was the fight he was talking about when he answered to me in the grand jury, I remember one fight and I only remember that it was one. Now, when he gave that vague almost meaningless answer, no one at that time knew about the 911 tapes and so he could get away with it until that became a matter of public record and we all found out. And I couldn't confront with him that because I didn't know about it, and that is how he slid around and would have continued had it not been brought to our attention by other means. But you see, so at that time he was safe. But when he got called on it--and you realize how only that it was one and he is talking about that event--that gives you a sense of how much he wants to help Mr. Simpson. Now, although on June the 20th when he was directly asked under oath about the past relationship of violence between the Defendant and Nicole, he said almost nothing, as I have indicated to you. And when he was interviewed by Mr.--now, when he was interviewed by Mr. Shapiro six days before that, he was a lot more forthcoming. When he was interviewed by Mr. Shapiro, as I pointed out during his testimony, he brought out the 1993 Gretna Green incident, he brought out the fight at the Jenner's Christmas party in 1993. But when I asked him one week later when he was under oath in front of the grand jury, I remember only one fight, only that it was one. Very different demeanor between the time that he spoke to me in front of the grand jury and the time that he spoke to Mr. Shapiro one week earlier. And doesn't that alone tell you how reluctant a witness he was for the Prosecution and how much he identified himself and wanted to identify himself with the Defendant's side? Now, after he spoke to the police, though, this is the position he finds himself in, so you know, so you understand why he had to come here and give the testimony he did. At the time he spoke to the police in the early morning hours of June the 13th, he didn't know that what he was giving was damaging evidence against the Defendant. He only knew he heard thumps on his wall, that is all he knew, and the events that transpired that night. He knew they went out to McDonald's. He knew that that he had done all the things that I will point out later for you, but they went to McDonald's, they had a burger, they came back. He went to his guest house, Mr. Simpson stayed outside. He later heard thumps on the wall during a phone call. At that point he didn't know the significance of what he was saying and he would surely never have told the police any of those things had he known what they meant. And so the problem was that once he told the police what had happened that night, he was stuck. He couldn't go back on his word. He had given them a detailed statement. It wasn't like he had given something vague that he could slide around with. He gave a very lengthy detailed statement to the police because he was telling the truth. He didn't know any better than to tell the truth. And so when he was called back before the grand jury, at the preliminary hearing and at this trial, he had to recount that same truth and he had to tell you, he had to tell you. Now, back to the timing. Kato told us that he was on the phone with a friend when the Defendant came out to the pool area near his door. And he was able to pinpoint that phone--that time with the phone call bill that he had, because the phone call was a long distance call. Now, the call was placed at 9:03 and it lasted for seven minutes, and when he saw the Defendant come out to talk to him, he hung up the phone, so it was about ten after 9:00. I think we do. At sometime after 9:00, approximately, and just so we have 9:10 here, maybe it was 9:09, the Defendant came out to talk to Kato. This is a very, very significant conversation that they have. I'm going to come back to this a couple of times, so here is the first time. The Defendant told Kato that he had only hundred dollar bills on him and he asked Kato if he had any fives for the skycap. You may recall that. Asked him if he had fives. Kato went to look and he realized he only had twenty dollar bills, so he gave the Defendant a twenty dollar bill which the Defendant took. Then the Defendant told Kato he was going out to get something to eat. He didn't invite Kato. Kato invited himself. Now, I remember when I heard that, I thought, what is wrong with this picture? This doesn't fit. If you are going out to eat and you only have hundreds, you need change, you are going to break that hundred when you go out to eat. Why do you have to ask Kato for fives? You have only got hundreds, wherever you go, you can break it if you are going out already anyhow, so what is the point? Now, keep that thought in mind because I'm going to come back to that. That is very significant. All right. That was at about 9:10. They left immediately and they drove to McDonald's in the Defendant's Bentley. Did it strike you as odd that he would take a Bentley to a drive-through to McDonald's when he has got a Bronco? It is not like there is no other car. Now, you have seen the picture of the Defendant taken at the recital for his daughter, Sydney, earlier that night, and in this photograph he is wearing black dress slacks and like a white polo type shirt and a black--looks like a shirt to me because you can see the seams in the sleeve and a collar to it with the sleeves rolled up. But Kato told you that at the time he saw the Defendant, at approximately ten after 9:00, the Defendant was wearing a dark blue or black cotton sweat outfit that had long sleeves. So after the recital, the Defendant changed clothes. And that is important, too. I will come back to that. Kato had several occasions to notice the Defendant's hand during the drive to McDonald's and during the time that they paid and during the time they got change, and he noticed that there were no cuts on the Defendant's hands or he didn't notice any cuts on the Defendant's hands, to be more accurate, and that is actually an important distinction. You will notice, too, though, when you look at the photograph of the Defendant in the recital, you can see his left hand and you can see that as of the time of the recital when he is posing with Sydney, there is no cut on the back of the middle finger of the left hand. And that is important. Now, what is probably even more significant than Kato's lack of observation of any cuts on the Defendant's hand when they are there at the--at the drive-through lane is this: Kato wound up paying for the food with his own money. Paid for both of them. He handed the Defendant the money, the Defendant paid, the Defendant got change back and gave it to Kato. Gave it to Kato? Wasn't the whole point of talking to Kato to get change for the skycap, get fives for the skycap? Okay. Now you have another inconsistency here. First of all, he asked Kato to give him change when he is going out already. He can get it himself. Secondly, he has the opportunity to get change right there at the drive-through window, either take Kato or break the twenty that Kato gave him, and he doesn't take that opportunity. That is important, too. I will come back to it. They return to Rockingham and Kato proceeded--I wanted to indicate when they returned, during the ride home, the Defendant wolfed his food down while he was driving. Kato saved his. And I will--all of these facts are going to be tied in at the end of this presentation, so I ask for your patience. Bear with me. I want to stick with the timing right now so I don't get distracted. When they got back to Rockingham, Kato got out and he walked toward the house expecting the Defendant to follow him, but when he got to the front door, he turned and he realized, he is not here, and he saw the Defendant still standing by the Bentley watching him and he had not moved. So as Kato told you, he took the hint, turned and went to his room. Now, why didn't the Defendant just walk in the house? Or if he intended to go somewhere, why didn't he just get back in the car and go either in the Bentley or in the Bronco? Why wait for Kato to be out of sight? I will come back to that. I just want--let's think about it for a minute. Now, as soon as Kato got back to his room he called friend and fortunately the friend lived far enough away that it was a long distance call, so we have his phone bill that indicates what time it was. And he indicated that he made that call as soon as he got back to his room, so--the call was made at 9:37, so he left the Defendant's presence at 9:36, and you can see here at 9:36 the Defendant was last seen standing in the driveway. From 9:36 until 10:54 the Defendant's whereabouts were unaccounted for. So we have the beginning of our window of opportunity at 9:36. Okay. Now, I would like to remind you of some testimony you heard about the Bronco. Back up for just a minute and talk about the car. Kato said the Defendant almost always parked the Bronco on Ashford. And when I asked him when during the six months that he lived there he could remember ever seeing it parked on Rockingham, he said that he couldn't come up with any answer.
I did ask him if he had seen the Bronco either when they left the house to go to McDonald's or came back, and he indicated that he didn't notice either way, he wasn't looking for the Bronco. But there was a witness who was out on Rockingham that night. He was out walking his dog between 9:30 and 9:45. That witness was Charles Cale. He was a neighbor of the Defendant's. And when he was walking his dog--he was a neighbor of the Defendant's. He knew where the Defendant lived and I think he indicated that he had been on Mr. Simpson's property at some point. So he was walking his dog that night between 9:30 and 9:45, and as he did so, he walked down Rockingham. And he looked and he could see, I think he indicated it was sixty yards away, but he could see that from 180 feet that there was no Bronco parked on Rockingham between--when he was walking his dog approximately between 9:30 and 9:45. Now, there are two inferences we can draw from this. Either one is reasonable. Either the Bronco was on Ashford, which is why he didn't see it on Rockingham, or Mr. Simpson had already left in the Bronco by the time he walked his dog. Now, he--Mr. Cale also indicated that when he left his home on June the 13th at 7:00 A.m., when he drove down Rockingham, he did see the Bronco and he noticed it was parked at kind of a funny angle to the curb. Now, what that tells us then, let's adopt--well, we have two reasonable inferences and I'm going to talk to you about this a little bit later. We have a jury instruction on direct and circumstantial evidence. And that jury instruction tells you that when you have two inferences, both of which are equally reasonable, one of which points to guilt, one of which points to innocence, you are to adopt the interpretation that points to innocence. That is, if both of them are equally reasonable. Now, in this case at the point that Charles Cale is walking down Rockingham and is walking his dog and sees no Bronco on Rockingham, since he didn't look down Ashford, it is equally reasonable that the Bronco could have been on Ashford as it is that the Defendant had already left in the Bronco. The inference is that--that points to the Defendant's--that is less inculpatory, that is less incriminating, that is, the Bronco was on Ashford. Let's take that one. Okay. So let's infer from his testimony that when Mr. Cale was walking his dog the Bronco was on Ashford. What does that tell you? It wound up on Rockingham. That is where it was found in the early morning hours of June the 13th. No one is disputing that. The Bronco was moved. And the inference to be drawn from that is that the Defendant was out in the Bronco and he moved it, but you don't have to rely on just that inference. We have more. And what we have--we have two things: As you may recall, Dr. Baden was the Defense witness pathologist. He testified that the Defendant told him that he had gotten cut when he went out the night of June the 12th. As he was preparing to get into the limo, he went to get the cell phone from the Bronco. That tells you the cell phone was in the Bronco. I'm going to talk about how he got that cut a little later, but the cell phone was in the Bronco. That is where he had to go and get it from when he was getting ready to get into the limo. If the cell phone was in the Bronco and he is using the cell phone that night, he was out in the Bronco. And we have the proof for you in the form of the Defendant's phone bill--this is really small.
This is a little bit smaller. I'm going to hold it closer so you can see it. This you will have back in the jury room. Let me tell you now the exhibit that I use that I don't say a "People's" for you, you are not going to get those back in the jury room, so if you want to take notes or if anything will help trigger your memory from those, go ahead and do it, because you won't have it again. Here is the exhibit that we marked during the trial. You will have this one back there with you. It indicates that the Defendant made two phone calls on the night of June the 12th from his cell phone that we know now was in his Bronco at 10:03. Now, in terms of timeline and on that night, what this tells you is that the Defendant was outside--was out in his car at 10:03. Now, at that time he made phone calls to Paula Barbieri, you may recall we heard the testimony of the--I think it was Luellen Robertson of Airtouch--and she told you--she interpreted the records for you and what it meant and she told you that the calls were not completed, but we didn't need her to tell you that. The calls to Paula Barbieri were not answered because Paula Barbieri was in Las Vegas. She was not at home either in Florida or in Los Angeles. She was in Las Vegas at the mirage. You recall we had a witness testify to that. She checked into the mirage at 2:00 p.m. On June the 12th, so she was not available to take those calls. Now, I think we have further corroboration for the fact that the cell phone was in the Bronco in the fact that Allan Park, the limousine driver, testified that he saw--as they were loading up the limo, he saw the Defendant go out towards Rockingham, out to where we know the Bronco was parked, once or maybe even twice, so there is further corroboration for the fact that he went and got the cell phone out of the Bronco just before they left. Now, that--those phone calls are very significant in terms of their timing, because you realize that at 10:03, when he is out in the Bronco and he has made those calls, that the murders occurred about ten to fifteen minutes after that, so we will talk more about the state of mind that he was in at that time. We will do it a little later. Now, Kato--let's go back to Kato. He indicated that at about 10:15 or 10:20, and he is very approximate on these times, he is not looking at his clock, I think he readily admitted that to you, he made a phone call to his friend Rachel Ferrara and that was a local call, so unfortunately we don't have a phone record to establish exactly when it occurred. This is an estimate on his part. Now, he testified, and I'm sure you recall it, that during the phone call, and he thought it was about a half an hour after he made the call, he heard those thumping noises on his wall, very loud, so loud and so strong that the wall he was leaning on shook and a picture moved and he said it was right in the area of the air conditioner, the air conditioner that hangs over that narrow dark south pathway. Those noises got him so upset he suspected that it was an earthquake. He also told you he had suspicious that it might have been a prowler and so he decided that he would go and see what might have caused them.
And he told Rachel he was scared and worried enough that he told Rachel that if she didn't hear from him in the next ten to fifteen minutes to call the police. Now, he may have said it half jokingly, but it is pretty clear he was worried. He was shook up. He was very shook up by those sounds that he heard, which is why he kept coming back to the issue and he kept trying to talk to the Defendant about it, and Allan Park, the limo driver. Now, let's talk about Allan Park for a minute. You remember he was the young man who had never been to Brentwood before, so he decided to make sure that he wouldn't be late, and although he was not supposed to be there until 10:45 for this pick-up to lax, he left at 9:45 to be on the safe side. And you may remember that this was a witness who was absolutely neutral, absolutely neutral. He was not going to strain to avoidance. He was not going to make any effort to embellish anything. This was a witness who was going to tell it straight and tell it honest all the way through no matter who was asking the questions, myself or the Defense. And he stood up there and he took the grilling for a very long time, and went back and I counted, the cross-examination and recross-examination by Mr. Cochran took up 175 pages of transcript in these proceedings. Now, he told you that on that night he was driving down Sunset he made a right at Rockingham and drove up Rockingham at 10:22. Now, he looked at his clock and his watch many times that night and the reason he did is very obvious. He is a driver. It is important that he be on time. It is important to him, it is important to his job and this was an important job. I mean, he is going to drive for Mr. Simpson, you know, it is not just me, somebody like that, or somebody that--ordinary average folk. He is important. He has to do well. And he certainly doesn't want to be late, make Mr. Simpson miss his flight, so he is checking that clock and at 10:22 he drives up Rockingham and he is looking at the curbs to see the addresses because he has never been there before and he wants to see 360 Rockingham. This is logical. I mean, what do you do when you are looking for an address? You look at the curbs and you try to see where it is and that is what he did. And when he did that, when he did that, he saw no Bronco parked on Rockingham and he was looking right there at the curb. Do we have the picture? This is People's 62-A, your Honor. Kind of looks faded on the--you can see it, right? See that curb area? You can see there is a 360 there. Now, as he was driving up, he said I could see--I could see the 360 on the curb. Now, if he could see the 360 on the curb and you can see where the Bronco is right there, that big white car, he is not going to miss it, he is going to see it. If he is driving slowly enough to see the number on the curb and realize that he has hit the Defendant's address, then he is obviously paying enough attention to see a big `ol white car there. And he didn't see it. So we know that at 10:22 the Bronco was not on Rockingham, but we know more, because we know at this point when Allan Park turned the corner onto Ashford, he told you he did not see any Bronco on Ashford either. So as of 10:22 that Bronco is gone and the Defendant is gone. That is further corroboration for what we told you with the phone calls in the Bronco. He was out in that Bronco on that night. So he indicated that he turned right onto Ashford, he made a U-turn and he parked across the street from the Defendant's home from the Ashford gate side. He got out of his car. Remember, he sat--he went and sat on the curb behind the car and had a cigarette, waiting for it to be time to start buzzing for the Defendant. And when he the back in his car he looked at the clock and he saw that it was 10:39. Now, at 10:39 he decided to check out the other gate, the Rockingham gate, and see if that would be easier to pull into than the Ashford gate, because remember he told you that he had a stretch limo, kind of hard to maneuver, so you know what gate he went in and where he was. This was an important consideration for him. Logistics were not this easy with that car. When he drove down to the Rockingham gate, he told you that he pulled the driver's side window parallel with the driveway so that he could look into the driveway and see whether it would be easier for him to get the stretch limo up that side of the driveway because of the way it curved. And you guys remember, you were there, you saw, it is a curving driveway. When he did that, the area where the Bronco was found on the curb just north of the Rockingham gate, was well within his field of vision, but he didn't see it. Again, further corroboration the Bronco was not there. Now, he backed up Rockingham and he backed all the way up past Ashford and then made a left pack onto Ashford, and at that point he actually pulled up into the Ashford gate, so that he is--the headlights would be almost up against the Ashford gate I think he indicated. And he told you that he saw a 300ZX, a black one, parked to his left on Ashford Street just to the left or east of the gate. And Kato told you that's right, that was my car. That was there. And you even see it in some of the photographs that we have shown you during the course of this trial. Now, when he pulled up facing the Ashford gate, Mr. Park told you that it was 10:40 and he looked at his clock. At that point he turned off his headlights and left the parking lights on and he got out to push the buzzer at the Ashford gate. He wanted to let the Defendant know that he was there. He pushed the buzzer he told you a good two or three times and he heard the buzzing and the ringing noise as did he that, but he got no answer. He was concerned, because the pick-up was supposed to be, he told you, for 10:45, starting to get up there now, so he called his boss and he wanted to ask him what he should do. Do we have it here?
I have a board that shows Allan Park cell phone records and that was a very important cell phone record because that helps us link a lot of events that were testified to that were approximately, and with the help of his cell phone record, we have much more definite times, much more precise.
All right. Mr. Escobar, if you would just briefly show Defense counsel. All right. This is People's exhibit--
Thank you. Can we hold it here, David? Hold it up close to you so you can see it. Can you all see it? Okay. All right. He made the call to his boss at 10:43. You can see. We show you when the call begins and when the call ends. Dale St. John was his boss and he called his pager. After he placed that call, he told you that he got to ring the intercom a few more times, so now he rang the intercom at 10:40, no answer. 10:04, no answer. And he said he rang it a few times. On each occasion, no answer. He noticed that there were no lights on downstairs and there was one light on upstairs. He got back in the car and he called his mother and he got his boss' home phone number and called him again at 10:49. You see that call--we have a lot more calls in here, but at 10:49 he called his boss again, and he left a message because he got no answer. Now, when he left that message at 10:49 for his boss after he hung up, he got out and tried the buzzer again. Now, this is the third time he has tried to get someone to answer that buzzer at the gate. The third time that he rang two or three times, and this third time again he got no answer. Now, he also testified throughout all these events, getting in and out of the car and buzzing--you guys can sit. I will come back to it in a minute. I don't want to wear you out.
Thank you. He told you also, if you recall, that during this time that he was out by the Ashford gate he was paying attention to who was there. He was trying to reach the Defendant, but he was very focused on whether he could get somebody to answer the buzzer, or whether he could get Dale St. John to call him back. I mean, these were the things that were occupying his mind. And he was carefully concerned about this because he had to get to the airport. But he was not listening for traffic. He was not listening to hear if a Bronco pulled up. And he told you it would not have been significant to him if he had heard a car pull up or a car door slam. So what he is thinking is I've got to get somebody to the airport. He is not thinking what cars are driving by, who is here, who is not here. He just wants to get going, he is late and he is worried about that. So although it would have been nice if he could have told us that he heard the Bronco pull up on Rockingham when it did, he just wasn't paying attention to that and so he can't give us any information on when the Bronco did pull up. We know it did because it got there. We know it wasn't there as of 10:49 when he drove down Rockingham and it was there later that night. All right. Back to Park. Now, after he tried the buzzer at ten--after calling his boss at 10:49, he got out--it was when he was actually buzzing at that point--let me back up for a second. He called his boss at 10:49 at home. He got no answer. He went out to the gate and he rang the buzzer again two or three times and got no answer. While he was at the gate that third time he heard his car phone ringing and he went back into the car. It was his boss calling him. That call came in--that last call came in at 10:52 and he indicated--now, he told you about the fact that his boss called him and he told his boss that no one had been home and he had been ringing for awhile and he was very concerned because he was running late. Now, at that time I asked him, were you seated in your car when you were speaking to your boss? He said yes. Where were you looking? I was looking through the gate right into the driveway. What is the driveway lighting like? What is it like in there? Well, it is not really very well-lit. The one in front. I'm going to pull out a diagram of Rockingham in a minute and show you exactly what I mean. It was dark, though, very little light. There was a light over the garage and it gave very little illumination and it did not light up the south pathway area at all. So he sat in his car talking to his boss looking straight through the gate and at the driveway.
Okay. This is just to get you oriented in case you forgot. It has been awhile since we went out and did the walk-through at Rockingham, so you see the area that says "Play yard" there and Park indicated that area was very dark. He indicated also, as he was seated in his car at the Ashford gate, that he could not see the Rockingham gate from where he was seated. He indicated to you--you see where that line is drawn at the garage? He saw nothing below that line. His field of view was limited to what was in front of that line and that is because of the lighting that was at the driveway. Now, when he told his boss about no one being home and it was running late, his boss said, well, he does run late. Mr. Simpson does run late. Why don't you check--look at the lighting in the--I believe he said the pantry area, because he usually watches TV there. Well, Park checked the area, he looked, and he couldn't see any lighting coming from that are and he told that to his boss. During this conversational Allan told you that he saw Kato come out on the side yard where the arrow is pointing, roughly in that area, I think it was a little bit farther back toward the tree, the other tree. That one, (Indicating). And he was holding a flashlight. You recall he told you that? And at the same time he said almost simultaneously he saw a person approximately six feet tall, 200 pounds, African American wearing all dark clothing, walking at a good pace up the driveway and he told you that he hung up.
Did he lie when he testified here in this courtroom saying that he did not use racial epithets in the last ten years? Yes. Is he a racist? Yes. Is he the worse LAPD has to offer? Yes. Do we wish that this person was never hired by LAPD? Yes... But the fact that Mark Fuhrman is a racist and lied about it on the witness stand does not mean that we haven't proven the Defendant guilty beyond a reasonable doubt.
It would be a tragedy if with such overwhelming evidence, ladies and gentlemen, as we have presented to you, you found the Defendant not guilty in spite of all that, because of the racist attitudes of one police officer.
somebody went to him and said how do you make an angel? Well, I take a piece of marble and I remove everything that is not an angel. That is what you have to do.
when you open up the windows and let the cool air blow out the smokescreen that has been created by the Defense with the cool wind of reason, you will see that the Defendant has been proven guilty easily beyond a reasonable doubt.