People Mistaken for Simpson Jurors Get Many Earfuls

John Aschenbach’s phone just keeps ringing and ringing and ringing some more.

Which would be fine, if his wife’s name were Anise. But it’s not. It’s Pamela.

Anise Aschenbach was one of the jurors in the O.J. Simpson trial. John and Pamela Aschenbach live in Long Beach and had never even heard of the juror until the day before a verdict was reached.

But they have now--having been swamped with about 100 calls from the media, many offering thousands of dollars for interviews.

More disturbing, they also have received calls from people threatening them with pay-back for the not guilty verdicts in the Simpson trial, to the point where John Aschenbach keeps a wary eye on the street.

“I just saw some guy walking down the street and he looked a little out of place,” said Aschenbach, an oil field worker. “I want to get the word out that I am not a part of this.”

The Aschenbachs are not alone.

There is Betty Moran of Los Angeles, who had the misfortune of being listed as “B. Moran” in the telephone directory, all the easier to be mistaken for former juror Brenda Moran. And there is the annoyance to Kevin Aschenbach, the only other person with that surname in the Los Angeles County phone listings.

Of all the juror names publicly identified thus far, Brenda Moran’s and Anise Aschenbach’s seem to have generated the most calls to the wrong people. The problem seems to be having an unusual name or, in the case of Moran, a prominent spot in the telephone listings.

One of the jurors who has been identified publicly is Gina Rhodes Rossborough. But her name would have little impact on others because there are no other Rossboroughs listed in the county phone directories. At the other end of the spectrum, a number of jurors had names common enough to preclude a barrage of calls to others with the same name.

That is small consolation for Betty Moran, whose nightmare has included calls at all hours from as far away as New York and Minnesota. The calls, she said, began five minutes after the Simpson verdict and included a $5,000 offer from one news organization just to talk about being mistaken for the Simpson juror. She declined.

Most disturbing to her, though, are the threats.

“Many of them don’t ask me if I’m Brenda,” said the foster mother who cares for six children. “They say, ‘You’re gonna die like a dog.’ ”

But she said she cannot stop answering the telephone because she is awaiting word on the condition of her ailing father.

For John and Pamela Aschenbach, the days have included calls from talk shows, including “Montel Williams” and “Larry King Live.” The networks have called, as have news magazines. He has kept the answering machine tape of the call from the National Enquirer in which a six-figure deal was mentioned.

“I told them all I wasn’t related,” he said. “For a six-figure amount, I wish I was.”

Truth be told, Aschenbach could not have cared less about the Simpson trial.

“I didn’t have any interest at all,” he said. “People at work would ask me what I thought about something going on in the trial and I couldn’t answer them because I really didn’t watch it at all.”

But he does worry about the effect of the threatening calls on his family, although there have been relatively few compared to the media queries.

“One guy said ‘Thank you for the verdict. You’ll get your pay-back,’ ” he said. “As much as I try to stay out of it, I get caught in the middle of it.”

For the other Aschenbach listed in Los Angeles County phone directories, it has been mostly a matter of an answering machine with four or five messages a day from the media.

“It’s not a big hassle because it’s only on the machine, but it’s kind of annoying,” said Kevin Aschenbach of Reseda. “A lot of them say, ‘We have a large sum of money we’d like to offer you for your story.’ ”