Simpson Attorneys Ask Judge to Bar Newest Prosecutor : Courts: Defense team cites Christopher Darden’s role in grand jury probe of Al Cowlings. Prosecution gets permission to compare dogs’ hairs to those on glove, cap.

Escalating their attack on the prosecution team in the O.J. Simpson murder trial, defense attorneys said Tuesday that they have filed a motion asking Superior Court Judge Lance A. Ito to remove one of the government lawyers from the case.

The motion was filed late Monday under seal, but Simpson’s attorneys said outside court Tuesday that they are seeking the removal of Deputy Dist. Atty. Christopher A. Darden, who was added to the Simpson prosecution team last week. They have previously voiced their anger about the prosecutor’s assignment because Darden oversaw the grand jury investigation of Al Cowlings, Simpson’s close friend who was at the wheel during the infamous low-speed pursuit from Orange County to Brentwood.

“Mr. Darden, he’s a fine lawyer, but he was involved in another investigation that was supposed to be separate,” said Johnnie L. Cochran Jr., one of Simpson’s lead attorneys.

Even as they pick jurors and debate a host of remaining legal issues, lawyers for both sides continue to build their cases and collect evidence. Tuesday, prosecutors received permission to clip hairs from two dogs--one owned by Simpson and another belonging to his son but kept by his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, who was killed along with Ronald Lyle Goldman on June 12. Simpson has pleaded not guilty to the double murder.

In a declaration filed with the court, Deputy Dist. Atty. Marcia Clark said “white to tan animal hairs characteristic of dog hairs” were found on a bloody glove discovered outside Simpson’s Brentwood mansion. Prosecutors want to have the FBI laboratory examine those hairs to determine whether they match those of the dog found wandering outside Nicole Simpson’s home after the murders.

They also want to compare hairs from a knit cap found at the crime scene to samples taken from Simpson’s dog. If the hairs match the respective dogs, it would put hair from Simpson’s pet at the crime scene and from Nicole Simpson’s animal at her ex-husband’s home--bolstering the prosecution charge that the ex-football star committed the killings.

The request for hairs is just the latest in the continuing attempts to figure out whose hair and blood is at the crime scene. DNA tests have shown that blood drops at the scene match Simpson’s genetic makeup, but defense attorneys have raised questions about some hairs located on and around the two bodies and have secured hair samples from the police detectives to see if any of them match. Simpson’s lawyers are hoping to show that detectives used sloppy techniques in collecting samples.

“We wanted the hair of the cops,” Cochran joked Tuesday. “They want the hair of the dogs.”

The attempt by Simpson’s attorneys to disqualify Darden, meanwhile, was the latest flare-up in the defense’s continuing protest that the grand jury investigation of Cowlings was merely a ruse to develop more information against Simpson. Prosecutors deny the defense allegations, and have said that they painstakingly kept the two cases from overlapping.

Cochran has also suggested that Darden was added to the government team because he is black and a predominantly black jury has been selected to hear the case. But Cochran said Tuesday that was not a focus of the defense motion.

Defending the assignment of Darden to the prosecution team, Dist. Atty. Gil Garcetti said last week that the move had long been contemplated because of Darden’s highly regarded legal skills and had not been thought up after the jury was sworn in. But Simpson’s attorneys latched onto that statement to suggest that prosecutors had failed to keep the Cowlings and Simpson cases separate, as they claimed, but rather had always planned on using information gathered in the Cowlings case against Simpson.

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“Now we have Mr. Garcetti saying he planned to put (Darden on the Simpson case) all along,” Cochran said. “We’re a little concerned about that.”

Although the district attorney’s office has not formally responded to the latest defense motion, prosecutors say there is no conflict created by Darden’s oversight of the Cowlings case. As long as the “dominant purpose” of that grand jury investigation was to seek evidence against Cowlings, not to surreptitiously gather information about Simpson, there is no problem with prosecutors later deciding to use evidence from the Cowlings investigation in the Simpson case, prosecutors have said.

Therefore, they have added, there is no conflict with Darden joining the Simpson prosecution because all the information from the Cowlings case can legally be shared with the Simpson prosecutors.

Evidence collected by the grand jury would probably be of interest to both sides in the Simpson case because authorities in the Cowlings investigation were attempting to determine whether Cowlings helped his lifelong friend flee from police June 17. Evidence of flight to avoid prosecution can be introduced to suggest a defendant’s consciousness of guilt, but Simpson’s attorneys have said that he was distraught and contemplating suicide when he and Cowlings were seen on the freeway that afternoon.

Legal experts described the defense’s call for Darden’s removal as unusual, and some suggested another possible motive. “I think the real issue is that Chris Darden is a very good lawyer,” said Gerald Chaleff, a prominent Los Angeles defense attorney.

While the two sides wrangled over dog hairs and Darden’s place on the prosecution team, they returned to court Tuesday to continue picking alternate jurors for the trial.

Of six prospective alternates interviewed, three were allowed to remain on the panel.

One is a 33-year-old woman who works for a moving company in Altadena. She said she was not surprised when she heard that Simpson had been arrested in the murders of his ex-wife and Goldman.

“Black men get picked on quite a bit,” that woman said in response to a question from Shawn Chapman, a member of Simpson’s legal team. “I felt the finger would be pointed there.”

Deputy Dist. Atty. Marcia Clark questioned the woman at length, but the prospective juror insisted that she could be fair.

Another prospective juror retained on the panel said he had served on a previous case that Clark prosecuted. That five-month trial ended in guilty verdicts and the prospective juror, a 39-year-old postal worker from Gardena, called the prosecutor “very sharp.”

Although Simpson attorney Robert L. Shapiro questioned the man extensively about his feelings toward Clark, the postal worker said he could set his positive impressions aside.

The last prospective juror retained Tuesday described a long history of contacts with police. Most of those, he said, were unfair. He asked, however, to speak privately to the judge and the lawyers about the specifics. That man, 31 and unemployed, insisted he could be fair to police witnesses despite his past experiences.

All three were asked to return Dec. 5., when the attorneys for the two sides will exercise peremptory challenges to remove panelists.

Earlier in the day, the first three prospects interviewed were all dismissed for expressing views that might favor one side or the other. Although their views of the evidence differed, all three also expressed reservations about serving on a trial that could last six months and that could force them to cut off ties with friends and family during that time.

One jury prospect, a 54-year-old man from Eagle Rock, was dismissed after saying he considered DNA tests highly reliable and felt that Simpson is probably guilty. Ito excused the man, who said as he left that his feelings were hurt at not being kept when he pledged to be impartial.

“They didn’t believe me,” he said to reporters. “They didn’t believe I’d be fair.”

He was followed by a man whose views seemed likely to favor Simpson. Among other things, that panelist said he had heard questions raised about the validity of police and prosecution testing of DNA samples collected in the Simpson case. That man, a 59-year-old meat cutter from Carson, was challenged by prosecutors and excused.

Another candidate for one of the 15 alternate slots said she too was inclined to believe that Simpson was guilty. In fact, when Cochran reminded her that Simpson was “cloaked in the presumption of innocence,” she laughed out loud.

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“As it stands right now, he seems to be a guilty man,” said that woman, a 72-year-old retiree from the San Fernando Valley. “But the defense has not put on its case.”

The same woman said she had a number of police officers and FBI agents as friends, and she expressed misgivings about interracial marriage “because it’s not fair to the children.”

Like other panelists interviewed Tuesday, the woman said she would have difficulty serving on a long trial, and Ito eventually cut off the questioning of her, saying: “I’m going to grant you your wish. You’re excused in this matter.”

Selecting alternates for the Simpson case has proved even more difficult than finding a panel of 12 jurors. So far, more than half of the prospective alternates who have been questioned have been excused; only 11 out of 29 have been asked to return Dec. 5. Six of the prospective alternates have failed to show up for questioning, one of several signs that the panelists may be unenthusiastic about serving as alternates.

If fewer than 15 alternates remain after peremptory challenges are exercised in December, another group of potential jurors waits in the wings, but calling that group in would further delay the oft-postponed proceedings.