THE O.J. SIMPSON MURDER TRIAL : Anonymous Letter Led Ito to Oust Juror : Courts: An employee of a literary agency said a San Gabriel woman kicked off the panel had a book deal, which she denies. Unsealed transcripts also tell why two other jurors were dismissed.

Superior Court Judge Lance A. Ito kicked a San Gabriel woman off the O.J. Simpson jury after he received an anonymous letter from a self-described receptionist at a literary agency who said her boss had made a secret deal with an unnamed female juror to write a book about her experiences, according to transcripts released Tuesday.

“It is obvious to me that this woman [juror] and her husband came to a conclusion of Mr. Simpson’s guilt and sold the book with that agreement,” the anonymous tipster wrote on May 12, setting in motion events that led to the dismissal of Francine Florio-Bunten on May 25.

Confronted by Ito, Florio-Bunten denied that she was the mystery author. However, Ito expelled her from the Simpson jury after he concluded that she had lied about receiving a note from another juror, Farron Chavarria, during his investigation of allegations that one of the jurors had entered into a book deal. The judge had ordered jurors not to talk with one another about the probe.

Florio-Bunten “out-and-out lied about this communication,” Ito declared to attorneys just before dismissing the 38-year-old telephone company worker. Eleven days later, on June 5, Ito kicked Chavarria off the panel for writing the note, which said Ito was investigating a juror’s book deal.

Since her dismissal, Florio-Bunten has consistently denied that she had a book deal, saying she considered the idea of profiting off her jury service “heinous.” She has contended that her jury service was “sabotaged” by persons unknown who wanted her off the panel, and joined the American Civil Liberties Union and media organizations in a successful bid to get the secret transcripts unsealed.

There is no corroboration in the transcripts that Florio-Bunten had a book deal or that her husband, a construction worker, had any discussions with a literary agent or brought the agent to the hotel where jurors are sequestered, as alleged in the anonymous letter.

After reading the transcripts Tuesday, Florio-Bunten insisted at a news conference that the transcripts vindicated her and offered a sense of “closure.” She steadfastly maintained that she never saw the note that Chavarria hastily wrote on a newspaper and apparently tried to show her, saying that Chavarria merely showed her a newspaper and asked whether she wanted to subscribe to the Wall Street Journal.

“I know I was accused falsely,” Florio-Bunten said. Her lawyer, Rex Reeves, said the anonymous letter was very skimpy evidence.

The transcripts also reveal that Ito booted Willie Cravin, a 54-year-old postal operations manager, for seven different incidents of physical contact and psychological intimidation of other jurors.

Cravin was accused of repeatedly bumping into and staring at Chavarria in what she described as “mind games” that left her crying hysterically one day in the bathroom. He denied doing anything wrong, saying that if there had been any bumping it was inadvertent, and he accused Chavarria of staring at him.

After he was dismissed, Cravin alleged that he had been targeted by prosecutors because he is African American. However, a multiracial group of jurors, including a Latino truck driver, an elderly white woman and three African Americans, complained about Cravin’s behavior.

The transcripts show that prosecutor Marcia Clark urged Ito to remove Cravin from the panel, saying she considered Cravin “a very severe and grave danger to the integrity of this jury and to their ability to evaluate the evidence.”

But defense lawyer Johnnie L. Cochran Jr. fought strenuously to keep Cravin on the panel, saying he had not engaged in any misconduct. “This stuff about staring, mind games, that’s preposterous,” Cochran said. He noted that when Ito asked jurors if they thought they could set their differences aside and reach a verdict, “they said yes.”

In the end, though, Ito told lawyers that he found Cravin’s denials not credible. He noted that Cravin was considerably bigger than Chavarria and he noted that other jurors had substantiated her accounts.

Ito told the lawyers he was dismissing Cravin for conduct that was “disruptive of the truth-finding process.” Like Chavarria, Cravin was kicked off on June 5, bringing to 10 the number of dismissed jurors and leaving the panel with only two alternates.

The judge noted that in his lengthy probe of problems on the panel, Cravin, Chavarria and Florio-Bunten had frequently been mentioned.

He told the attorneys: “I think by bouncing 1427, 1489 and 353 [the jury numbers assigned to the three] we have removed the warring parties.” No other jurors have been dismissed since that time.

The transcripts indicate that Ito’s dramatic speech at a May 11 forum, where a group of Japanese-American judges described the impact World War II internment camps had on their lives, apparently played a role in the events leading to the dismissals of Florio-Bunten and Chavarria.

The tipster from the literary agency wrote Ito in her May 12 letter, “I have not come to you sooner because I, too, feel Mr. Simpson is guilty.” But the writer, who described herself as a 20-year-old receptionist, said she decided to come forward “after seeing you last evening on television and seeing how what happened to your family and mine made you open your heart to the public.”

The tipster said in her letter that the book would be called “Standing Alone--A Verdict for Nicole.” The letter writer described the woman juror as “about 40 years old, Caucasian,” having been originally been an alternate and a person whose husband had become ill. On May 25, Ito confronted Florio-Bunten with this accusation, saying she was the juror who “most accurately” fit the person described in the letter.

Florio-Bunten strenuously denied that she was writing a book, calling the accusation “ridiculous,” “not true,” “heinous” and “the farthest thing from my mind.”

Later that day, however, Juror 1492, a county worker, told Ito that she had observed Chavarria scribbling a note to Florio-Bunten on a newspaper.

Chavarria admitted “scribbling” a note. She said this was an attempt to remind Florio-Bunten to tell Ito that Florio-Bunten had heard from her husband that Juror 247, a 43-year-old black manufacturing representative, was writing a book. Florio-Bunten had already told Ito about the conversation with her husband. Subsequently, Juror 247 denied to Ito that he was working on a book.

After dismissing Cravin and Chavarria, the transcripts show, Ito had a kind of heart-to-heart chat with the lawyers about the seemingly unprecedented scrutiny of everyone involved in the case--including jurors. He noted that virtually all the information was coming from people outside the case. Clark then suggested that “this case may be a good platform” to change the law so that juror questionnaires are not publicly released. “Maybe now we are seeing a good reason why they shouldn’t be.”

But Ito responded that even though it had been “disruptive” trying to cope with all the tips from outsiders, useful, relevant information had come forth. “If people are hiding things and this is a truth-finding process, I don’t know. It cuts both ways.”