Simpson Case Lawyers Feud Over DNA Tests : Courts: Shapiro wants prosecution held in contempt. Clark denounces defense’s ‘hypocritical ramblings.’

In an emotional exchange over the testing of blood samples in the O.J. Simpson murder case, defense attorneys accused prosecutors Wednesday of lying and hiding evidence, prompting Deputy Dist. Atty. Marcia Clark to denounce what she called “hypocritical ramblings” intended to influence the public.

The bitter exchange came during a status conference and erupted over a dispute about DNA tests--a key element in the investigation of the June 12 murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Lyle Goldman. O.J. Simpson has pleaded not guilty to those killings. His trial is scheduled to begin Sept. 19, and with that date growing near, both sides Wednesday accused each other of withholding evidence that they are obligated to turn over to their adversaries.

In other developments:

* Robert Tourtelot, the lawyer for a Los Angeles police detective who discovered a key piece of evidence in the case, said he will fight a defense subpoena issued Aug. 10 for his client’s military records. The lawyer said he does not expect the records to reveal anything damaging about Detective Mark Fuhrman’s military service, but added that he considers the request an invasion of Fuhrman’s privacy.

* Superior Court Judge Lance A. Ito said he has prepared a tentative schedule for the trial that anticipates it lasting through Christmas. Without explanation, Ito said he is not inclined to grant a two-day recess around Election Day, as the acting secretary of state had requested in an effort to ensure a higher voter turnout.

* Ito also changed his plans to issue a decision Friday on whether prosecutors would be granted access to a mysterious envelope handed over to the court by the defense during last month’s preliminary hearing. A court spokeswoman said that after a closed-door hearing, the judge indefinitely tabled the matter.

* Defense attorney Gerald F. Uelmen revealed that the Los Angeles Police Department served a search warrant on Simpson’s business office, Orenthal Enterprises. He did not disclose what the detectives were seeking, but sources said the warrant was issued in connection with a grand jury probe of Al Cowlings, Simpson’s close friend who accompanied him after Simpson failed to surrender to authorities June 17.

Donald Re, the lawyer who represents Cowlings, said he did not know what authorities hoped to discover with the warrant. According to sources familiar with the case, a number of witnesses--including Simpson’s friend Robert Kardashian, Kardashian’s girlfriend and four doctors who were at Kardashian’s home on the morning that Simpson and Cowlings disappeared--have been served with subpoenas ordering them to appear before the Los Angeles County Grand Jury.

Since Simpson’s first appearance in court, his lawyers and prosecutors have engaged in often testy exchanges. But Wednesday’s was the most acerbic, and it erupted over a dispute about blood samples that prosecutors hope to have tested at a California Department of Justice lab in Berkeley.

Clark, who had previously indicated that all DNA tests of blood samples were being conducted at a Maryland lab, disclosed that defense attorneys were notified Friday that several other samples maintained by the Los Angeles Police Department were sent to a Berkeley lab. Clark said the defense was not told earlier about the new testing because she had assumed that the samples had already been sent to Maryland and only recently learned they had not.

Clark did not explain whether police or prosecutors were to blame for the miscommunication. Cmdr. David J. Gascon said police officials would not comment on the matter because they believe evidence should only be discussed in court.

Simpson attorney Robert L. Shapiro, who has asked for portions, or “splits,” of all samples so the defense can conduct its own tests, said in court he found it difficult to believe that prosecutors had just now come upon previously overlooked items of evidence.

“It seems very bizarre to me that the lead prosecutor in the case does not communicate with the laboratory in charge of handling essential evidence in the case,” Shapiro said, calling Clark’s account “very questionable.”

He accused prosecutors of violating Simpson’s right to due process, and asked Ito to hold them in contempt.

Shapiro’s accusations were echoed by the normally soft-spoken Uelmen. “What we’re really dealing with here is an attitude problem,” Uelmen said.

“We cannot rely on the good faith and the candor of the prosecution,” he said. “I’m sorry to say that Your Honor cannot rely on that candor or good faith, either.”

The comments from the defense lawyers infuriated Clark, who lashed back, accusing them of “hypocritical ramblings” and “hysterical proclamations” intended to influence public opinion.

Defense lawyers have long been aware of the issues concerning the DNA testing, Clark said, adding that she and her colleagues have promptly turned over information as quickly as they have received it.

“The only reason that the defense claims to be surprised today is that they have not read what they’ve been given,” Clark said, her voice trembling slightly. “Or if they have read it, perhaps they have not understood it.”

Pacing back and forth and occasionally jabbing the lectern with her pen, Clark accused Simpson’s lawyers of leveling accusations solely to influence public opinion about the case.

“The defense proclamations of ignorance and being deprived . . . are nonsense,” she said. “I’m getting very tired of hearing all of these hysterical proclamations about how they’re being denied things and about what the prosecution is doing. If they would look at the discovery they’ve been given, they would know that their ignorance is their own fault. I cannot make them read.”

In fact, Clark said, prosecutors have gone so far to protect the defense’s rights that Simpson’s defense team “owes me not only an apology but a debt of gratitude.”

Clark did not get the apology she sought, but Ito did not find her or any prosecutors in contempt, as Shapiro had requested. The judge ordered another hearing on DNA evidence next week. He also ruled that in the meantime, prosecution experts may begin preliminary work on the DNA samples sent to the Berkeley lab, provided that one of Simpson’s experts is on hand to observe that process.

The vitriolic disagreement over DNA tests highlighted a hearing that touched on many aspects of the case and featured jockeying not only by defense attorneys and prosecutors but by one of the investigating detectives as well.

Simpson’s lawyers are seeking to subpoena Fuhrman’s military records as part of their effort to show that Fuhrman is an unreliable witness. They have obtained public court records of a 1983 pension case in which he made racially charged comments and said he was preoccupied with violence.

City-hired psychologists suggested that Fuhrman was lying to get a pension--a challenge to the detective’s credibility that Simpson’s attorneys hope to exploit. It was Fuhrman who saw a bloodstain on Simpson’s Ford Bronco after the murders. Fuhrman later found a bloody glove at Simpson’s estate.

After members of the defense team suggested that they might argue that Fuhrman planted the glove, the detective struck back, hiring a lawyer and threatening to sue Shapiro and the New Yorker magazine, which published some of the defense allegations.

That lawyer, Tourtelot, appeared in court Wednesday and said he intends to fight the defense request for access to his client’s military records. “I want to make it clear that there’s nothing in those files that we are concerned about,” he said. “This is a fishing expedition that intrudes on his right of privacy.”

Ito did not rule on that issue, saying he would take up the matter Aug. 31 when he will also consider a defense motion for access to the records of several officers.

Simpson lawyer Johnnie L. Cochran Jr. said the motion will include requests for records of Fuhrman along with those of Detectives Philip L. Vannatter, Tom Lange and Ronald J. Phillips, the four detectives who responded to the murder scene.

On Aug. 31, Simpson’s lawyers must also turn over information about witnesses and evidence that may be introduced at trial.

Prosecutors have begun turning over material to Simpson’s attorneys. About 2,000 pages of so-called discovery material was handed over Thursday.

Deputy Dist. Atty. William Hodgman complained that all the defense team has supplied so far to prosecutors are two tape-recorded interviews. Under California law, the defense is normally required to turn over information about its witnesses and evidence 30 days prior to trial, but Simpson’s lawyers argued that the circumstances of this case make that difficult.

Ito granted the short extension. He added that he expected defense attorneys, with their formidable group of lawyers and private investigators, to comply with that deadline.

* COURT-WATCHERS’ JACKPOT: O.J. Simpson, Heidi Fleiss will go to trial on the same day. B1