Simpson Team Attacks Ito in Stormy Session

Their chances to confront former LAPD Detective Mark Fuhrman with his own words curtailed by a stunning ruling, attorneys for O.J. Simpson accused the judge of incoherence Friday and tried a new tack in their effort to discredit Fuhrman as a lying racist, this time through new witnesses rather than tapes and transcripts.

The result was a chaotic, unproductive court session that made little headway while managing to irritate an increasingly unhappy jury--whose members are battling everything from restlessness to some recent bouts with seasickness.

When Superior Court Judge Lance A. Ito finally called the panel into his courtroom near the end of the session, it was only to apologize and inform the jurors that there would be no testimony for the fourth consecutive day. One juror, a middle-aged black man who complained bitterly to the judge and lawyers earlier this week, angrily gripped his pen at that announcement, his hand trembling and his jaw set.

Anxiety over the jury’s well-being did not prevent the attorneys from frittering away the entire court session Friday: The two sides argued about witnesses, sharing evidence, new defense accusations of a police-prosecution cover-up, and another defense effort to suppress evidence seized at Simpson’s estate on the morning after the murders of Ronald Lyle Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson--a double homicide to which Simpson has pleaded not guilty. Virtually none of the issues were resolved.

Overshadowing all of it was the previous day’s dramatic ruling, in which Ito decided that Simpson’s lawyers could only present two of 61 excerpts from interviews between Fuhrman and an aspiring screenwriter. The judge’s order, released late Thursday, infuriated Simpson’s attorneys, who leveled an extraordinarily angry and personal set of charges against Ito, all but accusing him of racism and of participating in a conspiracy to deny their client a fair trial.

When the lawyers reassembled Friday morning, the courtroom tension was palpable, and Ito seemed tired, distracted and determined to keep tempers from erupting. Gone was the normal light banter that generally precedes the jury’s arrival: Lead Simpson trial lawyer Johnnie L. Cochran Jr. skipped his normally cordial greeting to the judge and brusquely informed him that the defense team was not prepared yet to call the screenwriter, Laura Hart McKinny, to the witness stand.

Forbidden to introduce most of the statements from the tapes and transcripts of Fuhrman, defense lawyers sought to call witnesses instead to make substantially the same points.

According to Simpson attorney F. Lee Bailey, a woman named Natalie Singer will testify that Fuhrman used the word “nigger” in her presence and will say she was so offended by his use of the epithet and other remarks that she eventually ordered him not to return to her home. A second witness, Roderick Hodge, is prepared to take the stand and say that Fuhrman harassed him, arrested him and used racially derogatory language to insult him, Bailey added.

‘Door No. 2’

“The defense is going to keep trying this,” said Laurie Levenson, a Loyola law school professor. “If they don’t get what they want behind door No. 1, try door No. 2.”

But Deputy Dist. Atty. Christopher A. Darden furiously objected to the new defense tactic. He said prosecutors were not prepared for the witnesses and reminded Ito that he had earlier ruled he would only consider their testimony after determining whether it would add anything to two other witnesses who have yet to take the stand.

Ito, who was eager to bring the jury into the courtroom to hear at least some testimony, at first argued with Darden and accused the prosecutor of failing to research Hodge when he had the chance. Darden’s patience, stretched all morning, then broke.

“So the court’s prior ruling is out the door?” Darden asked sarcastically. “I don’t get to argue it? I don’t get to prepare? We just jam the prosecution and put this man up here and have him testify in front of the jury, judge?”

Clearly agitated, Ito responded: “Counsel, if you’ve known about him for five months and you haven’t bothered to interview him, that’s a problem, I agree.”

The judge and lawyer continued to wrangle for several minutes, with Bailey chiming in from a few feet away, where he stood behind his own lectern.

In frustration, Darden again tried to raise the issue of Ito’s earlier ruling.

“You said they were not going to be witnesses in this case because you have not ruled their testimony is admissible,” the prosecutor said pointedly.

“That is not what I said,” Ito said, rising to leave the bench.

“That is exactly what you said,” Darden retorted before storming from the courtroom.

When the two sides returned from a break, it appeared that Hodge, a broad-shouldered, dapper young man who waited patiently in the courthouse hallway as the attorneys argued over his fate, would take the stand.

Before he could, however, the judge warned Simpson’s lawyers that if Hodge covered the same ground as another proposed defense witness, he would entertain a prosecution motion to bar the other witness on the grounds that her testimony would be repetitive. That witness, Kathleen Bell, already has been mentioned to the jury, and the defense considers her testimony more significant that Hodge’s, so Ito’s warning caused defense attorneys to pause.

The result: After a long debate and a ruling in their favor that Hodge could testify, Bailey abruptly switched gears and said he wanted to call Singer instead. Ito did a long double-take as a few members of the audience gasped in frustration.

Ito said he was not prepared for that switch--and he also turned down the prosecution’s sarcastic suggestion that the defense call Simpson to the stand, since he was in court and available. Finally exasperated, Ito gave up trying altogether, insuring that the jury would return for a long holiday weekend without hearing any more evidence.

Jury Angry, Restless

The failure to call a single witness Friday meant that jurors have not heard any evidence since Monday’s session, fueling Ito’s deepening concern about the panel’s well-being.

When the jurors were brought back into court just before noon Friday, they wore grim faces, some glowering at Ito as he tried to be cheerful and appreciative.

“I seem to recognize most of you,” he said, joking about their long absence from the courtroom. Ito then asked about their trip to Catalina Island the day before, a voyage that caused some of the jurors to become seasick--they were, Ito told the attorneys, “barking at the seals.”

Apologizing for the repeated delays, Ito told the panel that he had wanted to put on at least one witness Friday but had run out of time.

“I don’t want to be overly dramatic about this with you,” he said. “But I want you to know that it pains me deeply to know that you’re there and that we’re not accomplishing things.”

Suppression Motion

From its earliest days, the Simpson trial has had a tendency to run aground, but Friday’s troubles were inspired largely by the lingering tension and questions caused by Ito’s order on the so-called Fuhrman tapes.

Those tapes, particularly Fuhrman’s boasts of manufacturing probable cause against suspects, inspired the defense to renew its motion challenging the searches of Simpson’s home on June 13, 1994. The defense made that motion at the preliminary hearing and again after the case was transferred to Ito. Both times it was denied, but Simpson attorney Gerald Uelmen said the tapes and transcripts constituted newly discovered evidence that casts doubt on Fuhrman’s credibility.

It was Fuhrman who found a red mark on Simpson’s car in the early morning hours of June 13, and that mark, which officers concluded was blood, was part of what persuaded them to jump Simpson’s wall and enter the grounds of his estate without a warrant. If Fuhrman cannot be believed, Uelmen argued, the judge should reconsider whether the initial search, and one that followed, were valid.

Those searches turned up a bloody glove, drops of blood leading up the driveway and into Simpson’s foyer, and a pair of bloodstained socks in his bedroom. Losing that evidence would be a crushing blow to the prosecution, but Fuhrman was not the only officer to testify about the circumstances that morning.

No challenge has been raised to the credibility of Detectives Philip L. Vannatter, Tom Lange and Ronald Phillips. As a result, argued Deputy Dist. Atty. Marcia Clark, even if the tapes and transcripts make Fuhrman’s testimony suspect, it should not cause Ito to reconsider his initial ruling on the validity of the searches.

Ito did not immediately rule on the issue, but instructed defense attorneys to file material with him over the weekend.

An Angry Cochran

Meanwhile, defense attorneys said they are preparing to ask Ito to reconsider his decision to exclude 59 excerpts from the tapes and transcripts--39 references to the word “nigger,” 18 instances in which Fuhrman said he had committed misconduct, and two excerpts featuring him criticizing the Simpson defense team.

Simpson’s lawyers were stunned by that decision, and Cochran could barely contain his anger toward Ito.

“I read your order, Your Honor, and with all due respect . . . there are some parts that are incoherent,” Cochran said. “We intend to file a motion of reconsideration on Tuesday.”

Ito, who accused defense lawyers of submitting an incoherent brief to him last week, coolly responded to Cochran’s criticism.

“My order is very clear,” he said.

“Not to us,” replied Cochran.

But even though Ito essentially dared the defense team to challenge him with an appeal, defense attorneys said that course is unlikely. Outside court, Uelmen noted that it was very difficult to persuade an appeals court to accept a mid-trial appeal, known as a writ, on an evidentiary ruling by the judge.

Exactly what the defense will do remains less clear. Members of the defense team remain committed to calling screenwriter McKinny to the stand, but say they are undecided about whether to play for the jury the two short excerpts that Ito allowed into evidence.

In addition, they intend to pursue their attack on Fuhrman through witnesses, principally Bell, who said Fuhrman told her that he would manufacture evidence in order to implicate members of interracial couples. Bell could be next week’s first witness, and her lawyer said Friday that she will be ready.

Bell is not necessarily looking forward to testifying, said her attorney, Taylor Daigneault, “but she’s not intimidated by it, either.”