THE O.J. SIMPSON MURDER TRIAL

UCLA law professor Peter Arenella and Loyola University law professor Laurie Levenson offer their take on the Simpson trial. Joining them is Los Angeles defense lawyer Gigi Gordon, who will rotate with other experts as the case moves forward. Today’s topic: Marcia Clark’s renewed opening statement and the first prosecution witnesses.

PETER ARENELLA

On the prosecution: “The message of Clark’s abbreviated but powerful rebuttal to Cochran’s opening statement was unmistakable: Don’t trust the defense, because they are willing to distort the facts and rely on witnesses whose credibility is suspect at best. That high point was followed through by the testimony of Detective Edwards, whose hostility to the defense was so obvious that Cochran used it effectively on cross-examination to undermine the officer’s credibility.”

On the defense: “As Clark’s statement demonstrated, Mary Anne Gerchas is a witness who comes with a great deal of dangerous baggage, making it hard to understand why Cochran chose to emphasize her expected testimony in his opening statement. Either the defense failed to check her background or they decided her past would not necessarily undermine her credibility with the jury. Neither explanation should provide Simpson with much comfort.”

LAURIE LEVENSON

On the prosecution: “It was a very good first day. They started quickly to paint a different picture of O.J. Simpson, but they did more than that. They showed Nicole to be a victim, O.J. to be a bad guy and police officers as just trying to help people. The dramatic photographs of Nicole’s beaten face countered any argument by the defense that this was just domestic “discord.”

On the defense: “I think the defense took the wrong tack. Cochran knows how to cross-examine and embarrass police officers. That may be winning the battle but losing the war. The bottom line is the defense should let this evidence go by as quickly as possible. This was one instance of violence and the prosecution doesn’t have any other evidence of violence.”

GIGI GORDON

On the prosecution: “I think it was a startling tactic to start off the case with domestic violence evidence, an incredibly unusual maneuver. Only history will tell us if it was a brilliant move or went over like a pile of wet cement. The prosecution presented a strong picture of Nicole as a captive in a luxurious prison, with O.J. as the brutal warden--the uncloaking of the real O.J., piece by piece. This will be done like water torture, drip by drip.”

On the defense: “Through his cross-examination, Cochran was able to establish that the prosecution fairy tale about the princess may not be the reality. Every action the police took was inconsistent with the picture that the prosecution painted. If it was so clear that Nicole was brutally beaten, why didn’t they take her to a doctor? After she told them O.J. had guns in the house and the kids were there, why did the police let him go back into the house?”