THE O.J. SIMPSON MURDER TRIAL : Courtroom Confidential : Reporter Recalls Panel’s Trip to Grauman’s Chinese Theatre in ’57 Hollywood Libel Case

When jurors visit crime scenes, as the O.J. Simpson murder trial jurors will do today, it usually is an orderly process.

But that certainly wasn’t the case during one of the most unusual jury trips in history.

I’ve been to a few in my career. For example, Patty Hearst’s federal court jurors saw the safehouses near San Francisco where she was hidden by the Symbionese Liberation Army kidnapers, and Dr. Sam Sheppard’s jurors were taken to his home near Cleveland, where his wife, Marilyn, was beaten to death.

The Hearst trip was enlivened by British reporters, who came in a hired limousine while the jurors arrived in a bus. During the Sheppard trip, an enterprising reporter rented a cherry picker, climbed to the top, and from that vantage point had a bird’s-eye view of the proceedings.

But it will be hard to match the jury trip during the Superior Court trial of Confidential magazine on charges that it published libelous, lewd and obscene articles about Hollywood stars.

This was 1957, and Confidential’s exposes, when compared to today’s revelations, were about as steamy as chocolate pudding.

Back then, however, the innocuous dirt being dished out by the highly successful scandal magazine was giving the movie moguls heartburn.

I flew out from New York for the trial, expecting to see a parade of movie stars as prosecution witnesses. Only two showed up to deny the magazine’s allegations--singer Dorothy Dandridge and actress Maureen O’Hara--and it was because of O’Hara that we had the unforgettable field trip.

Her Irish temper up, gorgeous, red-haired, green-eyed O’Hara came to court to denounce Confidential for printing an article that claimed that she and a “tall and handsome Latin American,” described as her “south of the border sweetie,” had been seen by an usher making out in Grauman’s (now Mann’s) Chinese Theatre.

This allegedly happened in Row 35. The title of the disputed article was: “It Was the Hottest Show in Town When Maureen O’Hara Cuddled in Row 35.”

And to make things even worse, the film the amorous twosome should have been watching was “The Robe,” with its religious theme. Alerted by the usher, the horrified manager told the pair to leave, the magazine alleged.

Even before O’Hara took the stand, there was conflicting testimony about whether the “entwined twosome” was allegedly carrying on in Row 35 or Row 40, which was the last row in the section.

One juror requested that jurors be taken to the theater so they could see for themselves.

Superior Court Judge Herbert V. Walker agreed and arrangements were made for the panel to be taken by bus to Grauman’s Chinese. The next day the theater was opened at 10 a.m. With the press, the defendants, the judge, the lawyers, the court reporter and other officials in attendance, the jurors solemnly marched up the aisles.

As usual when accompanying a jury to a crime scene, we reporters stayed at a respectful distance. As we milled around in the darkened theater, we heard some strange sounds, and then running feet. We ran too, following the noise, and found the bailiff apparently wrestling with one of the jurors.

What he actually was doing, we discovered to our great joy, was prying one of the male jurors--a very large fellow--out of a seat in Row 35, where the juror had gotten stuck on his back. It turned out that he was trying to see if it was physically possible to do in that seat what Confidential claimed Maureen was allegedly doing with her beau.

He had gotten wedged in, squirming around, holding his arms up as if he were cuddling a movie queen. As we stood there, trying not to fall down laughing, the juror, who had bushy hair and an imposing mustache, bellowed that he merely was trying to re-create the situation in the interest of justice and the search for truth.

He then asked if we could go upstairs to see the two seats in a little balcony where the theater manager had said the projectionist sometimes went for a cigarette. Nobody really knew why he wanted to do that, but Judge Walker consented. So the bewildered group paraded up a narrow stairway, through the projection room, stared at the two chairs awhile, and then went back down and out to the bus.

The Confidential case ended in a mistrial, after what we learned later was bitter dissension in the deliberation room. The magazine subsequently made an out-of-court settlement and went out of business.

I sort of guessed that the deliberations by the sequestered jurors were never going to end in a verdict when I asked one of the deputies where the jurors were going to eat that night, and, without violating any rules, he responded:

“Well, Theo, three of them want Chinese, two of them want Italian, two of them want seafood and the rest don’t want to eat.”