One of the important evidences presented by the prosecution in court is the results of blood test and DNA test. Criminal experts agree that the results of blood test and DNA test will not lie, but if the blood is contaminated, improperly handled, hastily collected or deliberately planted, its credibility will be greatly reduced. In Simpson's case, all these defects exist.
The test results show that all doubts are concentrated on Simpson. Simpson's blood was found in two places at the murder scene; The hair extracted at the scene is the same as Simpson's hair; The blood gloves found by the police at the scene and Simpson's residence are the same pair, and both gloves have the blood of the victim and the defendant; Simpson and the victim's blood were found in the alley in front of Simpson's house, socks in the bedroom on the second floor and a white mustang. In this way, the prosecution's evidence can be called "blood evidence", and Simpson's alleged murder seems to be an undeniable fact.
However, the defense camp believes that these "blood syndromes" are full of doubts and flaws. First of all, the blood on socks is very strange. Defense experts pointed out that the blood on both sides of this sock was exactly the same. According to common sense, if the socks were worn on the feet at that time, the blood on the left outer side of the socks could never soak into the left inner side first, and then through the ankle to the right inner side. Only when the blood directly penetrates from the left side of the sock to the right side will the blood on both sides be exactly the same. In other words, the blood is likely to have been smeared. During the trial, the prosecution showed several photos of the scene where blood socks were found, but the time sequence on the photos was contradictory. On the day of the crime, there was no blood sock in the scene photo taken at 4: 13 pm, but there was a blood sock in the photo taken at 4: 35 pm. So, were the blood socks on the carpet? Or was it later moved to the carpet by the police? On this question, the police's answer was inconsistent and inconsistent. In addition, defense experts found that the blood on socks contained a high concentration of chelating agent (EDTA). Defense lawyers reminded the jury that the police added this chelating agent to Simpson's blood sample on the day of the crime.
Secondly, according to the on-the-spot investigation report, Goldman, who is tall and strong, once fought a bloody battle with the murderer. His personal belongings-a bunch of keys, an envelope, a piece of paper and a pager-were scattered in different places, which shows that the fight was extensive and fierce. Goldman's jeans have the shape of blood flowing downwards, which shows that he did not die in a very short time, but still stood up and fought to the death after being injured. He was stabbed more than 31 times, and finally died of cervical vein rupture and massive hemorrhage in the chest and abdomen. According to this inference, the murderer must be covered with blood all over his body. However, why only traces of blood were found on the white mustang? What is even more puzzling is why the murderer left a lot of obvious blood on the driveway of the front door of the fence and the path from the front door to the door of the house after getting off the bus. Also, suppose Simpson entered the front door of the house with bloody clothes and shoes and went to the bedroom on the second floor with bloody socks. Why didn't he find any blood on the doorknob, light switch and the white carpet in the whole house?
Thirdly, according to the blood test report, Simpson's blood was found in two places at the scene. On a path leading from the victim's body to the backyard of the apartment, the police found five drops of the defendant's blood, uniform in size and complete in appearance. However, the defense believes that if Simpson is stabbed in the struggle, according to common sense, he should bleed a lot at first, and the blood volume will gradually decrease after a while, so the blood drops can never be uniform in size. In addition, the blood drop should be thrown down during the struggle or walking, and landed in the state of impact. Therefore, the shape of the blood drop cannot be complete. In another place, the police found three blood stains on the door of the backyard fence of the apartment. However, the prosecution experts found a high concentration of chelating agent (EDTA) again when examining these blood stains.
Finally, defense experts accused that the criminal laboratory of LAPD was poorly equipped, poorly managed, and the inspectors lacked training, and failed to collect blood on the spot according to normal procedures. Due to improper handling of evidence samples, the test results are doubtful. For example, according to the normal procedure, when collecting blood samples for DNA analysis, the blood samples should be stained with cotton first, and then put into the evidence bag after being naturally air-dried. However, the police inspectors put the samples into the evidence bag before the blood has been air-dried. According to this, the defense lawyer Scheck said rudely: the criminal laboratory of the police station is simply a "polluted cesspit". The second important evidence presented by the prosecution is the black blood gloves that Forman found at the back of Simpson's residential room. However, this blood glove is also full of doubts.
First of all, according to Foreman's testimony, when he found the blood gloves, the blood on their surfaces was wet. Defense experts believe that this is absolutely impossible. The murder happened at about 1: 31 midnight on June 2, 1994, and foreman found the gloves at 6: 11 am on June 3, 1994, which spanned more than 7 hours. The defense demonstrated to the jury with a simulation experiment that under the weather conditions of sunny to cloudy and outdoor temperature of 21 degrees Celsius on the night of the crime, the blood stained on the glove must have dried up after 7 hours. So, why did foreman insist that it was wet? The explanation provided by the defense is that there is only one possibility, that is, foreman quietly put the gloves with wet blood into the police evidence protection bag he carried with him after he came to the scene of the murder. Then, he tried every means to find opportunities to enter Simpson's house and forge evidence while others were unprepared, so that the blood was still wet despite a long time span.
Secondly, suppose Simpson is a murderer. When he fled home from the murder scene covered in blood and panicked, and hid the murder weapon and bloody clothes without a trace, there was no need to reinvent the wheel and sneak to the back of the guest room to hide blood gloves. In addition, Simpson knows all about the backyard and terrain of his house. According to common sense, he is unlikely to bump into the air conditioner and make an earth-shattering noise, and he will ignore it after losing his blood gloves. From all aspects, it is obvious that the owner who crashed into the air conditioner and lost his gloves is a person who is not familiar with the land shape and roads in the house. In addition, if the murderer was in a hurry in the dark, fumbling and leaving things behind, why didn't he find other blood stains and suspicious footprints and traces at the scene of blood gloves?
Thirdly, although two gloves, one left and one right, were found in the crime scene and Simpson's residence by the police, and the blood of two victims and Simpson was found on the gloves, there were no cracks or knife marks on the appearance of these two gloves, and Simpson's blood was not found in the gloves. This shows that Simpson's hand wound is probably not directly related to blood gloves and murder.
Finally, in order to prove Simpson is the murderer, the prosecution decided to let him try on the glove stained with blood in front of the jury. In court, Simpson first put on ultra-thin rubber gloves to prevent fouling, and then tried to put on blood gloves. However, in full view, Simpson struggled for a long time but it was difficult to put on his gloves. The defense immediately pointed out that the glove was too small to belong to Simpson. The prosecution invited glove experts to testify, claiming that gloves might shrink after being stained with blood. However, defense experts believe that this is an advanced leather glove that has been pre-shrunk and will not shrink after being stained with blood. The prosecution and the defense argued endlessly, but in the eyes of some jurors, this blood glove was a little too small. During the Simpson trial, the most suspicious person in the defense camp was the prosecution's "star" witness, officer foreman. The police officer was not bad on the night of the murder. In that case, why did he take the trouble to get to the scene at midnight? Why did you volunteer to lead a team to Simpson residence? What is even more puzzling is why important evidence such as blood on the white mustang, blood gloves behind the guest room and blood socks in the bedroom on the second floor happened to be discovered by him alone. Is he a well-connected super detective or a police scum with many bad records?
In this context, Foreman naturally became the focus of investigation and cross-examination by defense lawyers. To this end, the defense has specially set up a free hotline, hoping that people from all walks of life can provide clues. As a result, the defense learned that the police officer had made many extremely bad racist remarks. For example, according to a witness named Kathleen Bell, during 1985-1986, Foreman threatened that if he found a black man and a white woman in the same car on the street, he would sound the siren and order to stop. If there is no reason to stop, he will make it up out of thin air. He even raved: I hope to see all the "niggers" gather in a pile, burn them to death or blow them up with bombs. Another witness reported that Forman worshipped Hitler, and he collected a large number of military medals of Nazi SS.
However, Foreman himself firmly denied the accusation of burning "niggers". Therefore, the defense camp asked Judge Ito for an order to allow lawyers to cross-examine Foreman and ask him if he had used the insulting word "nigger" in the past 11 years. The defense tried to use this as a breakthrough to completely discredit foreman's witness qualification. After Simpson's case, people from all walks of life criticized the defense's litigation strategy of playing the "race card" and criticized it bitterly. It is worth mentioning that on the controversial issue of "race card", laymen who are "watching the fun" accuse the defense lawyers one after another, while experts who are "watching the doorway" blame the presiding judge.
Some people may wonder whether Foreman has said the word "nigger" in the past 11 years and whether Simpson is suspected of murder. According to common sense, even if Foreman told a big lie about the "nigger", it does not directly prove that his testimony in the major case of the century is fabricated and forged; Even if the police officer has made some racist remarks, it can't prove that he deliberately planted and framed the defendant. This is a major case of the century in which Simpson was tried. Why did it accidentally become a case in which Officer Foreman was tried? During the trial, why did Judge Ito allow the defense to use this defense strategy of playing the "race card" and "reversing the general direction of struggle" regardless of the opposition of the prosecution?
Believe it or not, in the judicial system of the United States, despite the great controversy, the defense's "race card" strategy and Judge Ito's ruling are completely legal. Influenced by the tradition of "character evidence" in English common law, the evidence laws and precedents in the United States and California stipulate that if the character of a witness appearing in court is proved to be defective, some testimony of the witness appearing in court will have no legal effect. Therefore, in court trials, lawyers of both the prosecution and the defense will make a big fuss about the personal character of witnesses. In addition, after being sworn in by the court, if a witness deliberately lies in part of his testimony, then the jury can regard other testimonies of this witness as lies.
After the judge gave the green light, Lee Bailey, the defense lawyer, came up and asked Foreman, "Have you ever used the word' nigger' in the past 11 years?" Foreman replied, "As far as I remember, I have never used it." Leave a little leeway for lying. But can the lawyer spare him lightly and immediately grasp the ambiguity in the answer and ask, "You mean that if you called someone a nigger, you would have forgotten it?" This rhetorical question is simply capped! Foreman had to pretend to be confused: "I'm not sure if I can answer your question in this way." The lawyer pressed hard: "In other words, I want you to admit that since 1985 or 1986, maybe you have called a black man a nigger at some point, maybe you have forgotten it yourself?" Foreman had to bite the bullet and answer, "No, it's impossible." The lawyer struck while the iron was hot: "Do you take the oath?" The police officer had to answer, "That's what I mean." The lawyer asked from another angle, "If any witness testifies in court and says that you used the word' nigger' to describe a black man, is that person lying?" Foreman was forced to admit: "Yes, they are lying." In this way, the defense lawyers used impenetrable logic and excellent cross-examination skills to force Officer Foreman into the Jedi in no way back.
what a coincidence. Shortly after the end of the cross-examination, the defense learned from the tip-off phone that a female playwright had interviewed Foreman many times and recorded 14 hours of interviews in order to collect the life materials of the police in solving the case. After listening to the recording, the defense lawyer found that in the recorded conversation, whenever black people were mentioned, Officer Foreman used the insulting term "nigger" as many as 41 times. In addition, in an interview on July 28th, 1994, Foreman boasted: "I am a key witness of the great case of the century. If I don't help the prosecution to hold on, they will lose this great case. Blood gloves decide everything. If there are no gloves, bye-bye and stop playing. " He also claimed: "You just don't fucking understand. You don't need rules in the police business. It's all about feeling. Fuck the rules, it will be enough for us to lie then. " In the recorded conversation, Foreman also blatantly boasted about the experience of framing innocent people. He said, "I have detained people who don't belong to this area. If I have to give reasons, I will say that this person is suspected of theft." "Our police are not easy to handle. Even if we kill someone, we know what to say. "
The discovery of Forman's audio tape is a turning point in the great trial of the century.
The prosecution argued that the recording of the conversation was only the material of literary creation, and it was inevitably boastful and exaggerated, so it could not be regarded as legal evidence at all. But Judge Ito still ruled that the jury could hear part of the recording.
During the cross-examination in court, ullman, the defense lawyer, was expressive and slammed Foreman with heavy guns: "Is your testimony in the preliminary hearing completely true?" "Did you fabricate the police criminal investigation report?" "Did you plant and falsify evidence in this case?" Faced with these unavoidable legal questions, Foreman actually replied: "I hope to safeguard my fifth amendment privilege." In other words, by virtue of the right of silence of suspects stipulated by the Supreme Court in the famous Miranda case in 1966, he refused to answer the reasonable questions raised by the defense policy on the evidence presented in court. In his concluding remarks, defense lawyer Cochrane pointed out that Forman was "a racist who supported the policy of genocide, a perjury guy, America's most terrible nightmare and the incarnation of the devil".
in the American judicial system, the credibility of evidence is one of the key factors to win the lawsuit. As the detection organ of criminal cases, the police have the most evidence at the first time. Therefore, American law clearly stipulates that the police must testify in court on legal issues such as searching and testing evidence, which is an important link in court trial and procedural justice. The police are different from ordinary witnesses, and the special status of law enforcers determines the necessity for them to question the defense lawyers. Even in ordinary traffic violation fines, the police involved are still obliged to appear in court on time and swear by the Bible. There is a proverb in western judicial circles: "The police are public servants of the court". Therefore, Foreman's request to remain silent and refuse to reply to the respondent's question is absolutely absurd, which is actually equivalent to admitting in disguise that he is suspected of forging evidence and framing the defendant without being pressed. Legally speaking, Forman's testimony has lost its legal effect. The prosecution is almost certain to lose.
After Simpson's case ended, the Los Angeles District Attorney relentlessly filed a case against Officer Foreman. As a result, he was sentenced to three years in prison for perjury and supervised outside prison. In this way, Simpson, who was suspected of murder, was acquitted, and the law enforcer Foreman