On June 12, 1994, the bodies of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman were found dead at her home in Brentwood, CA. Orenthal James Simpson, or O.J. Simpson was notified of their deaths and immediately taken into custody for questions. Upon the collection of various pieces of evidence from the crime scene, all avenues pointed to Simpson as the culprit for the double murder. The conclusion of Simpson criminal trial resulted in his acquittal. There were various reasons for this acquittal. The most prominent reasons include accusations of racism, evidence contamination, and the lack of faith in DNA profiling. This paper will discuss the issues that arose with the trial in depth and offer an explanation and solution to resolving issues so that the issues do not repeat themselves in the future from the lack of knowledge and from learning from the mistakes of previous cases such as this one. The first issue, accusations of racism, played a pivotal role in ensuring the innocence of Simpson. Race seemed to have become the main issue in Simpson’s murder trial rather than the death of the two victims. This infamous trial became the face and main headliner of the media in 1995. The public saw two Caucasian victims and a black defendant. According to author Stanley O. Gaines, Jr., many Caucasian citizens took the side of then LAPD detective, Mark Fuhrman and many black citizens took the side of Simpson (Gaines 2001). The trial seemed to have transformed into a racial war rather than a criminal trial (Thernstrom & Fetter 1996). Caucasian citizens felt that Fuhrman was unfairly being discredited due to allegations of being a bigot and African American citizens believed that the acquittal of Simpson served as reparations of the unfa... ... middle of paper ... ...etter. (n.d.). Protecting the Crime Scene. Retrieved April 2, 2014, from http://www.crime-scene-investigator.net/evidenc1.html Gaines, S. (1995). OJ Simpson, Mark Fuhrman, and the moral “low ground” of ethnic/race relations in the United States. Black Scholar, 2546-47. Imwinkelried, E. J. (1992). Attempts to Limit the Scope of the Frye Standard for the Admission of Scientific Evidence: Confronting the Real Cost of the General Acceptance Test. Behavioral Sciences & The Law, 10(4), 441-454. Jasanoff, S. (1998). The Eye of Everyman: Witnessing DNA in the Simpson Trial. Social Studies Of Science (Sage Publications, Ltd.), 28(5/6), 713. Price, M. (2012). THE PROPER APPLICATION OF DAUBERT TO EXPERT TESTIMONY IN CLASS CERTIFICATION. Lewis & Clark Law Review, 16(4), 1349-1379. Thernstrom, A., & Fetter, H. D. (1996). From Scottsboro to Simpson. Public Interest, (122), 17-27.
“Two Towns of Jasper” may seem like a normal, modern day town but on the inside the citizens still hold ideas of segregation and racism. These ideas are then examined as the documentary investigates the trials of Bill King, Lawrence Brewer, and Shawn Berry. The three murderers tried for Byrd’s death were all Caucasian and in some way showed hatred toward African-Americans. Bill King and Lawrence Brewer had tattoos that represented the Aryan Nation, a public and political white pride organization, and Shawn Berry was also thought to have ties to the organization. When they beat and murdered Byrd the issue of race arouse and citizens began to question each other’s motives. African-Americans brought up issues of segregation and Caucasians tried to justify the segregation as a traditional way of life. Societal change was examined and made possible because cit...
After a lengthy two hundred and fifty-two-day trial “not guilty” were the words that left the world in shock. O.J Simpson was your typical golden boy. He had it all, the nice car, the football career, and his kids. Unfortunately, this all came to an end when two bodies came to be spotted deceased in Nicole Browns front yard and was a gruesome sight. O. J’s ex-wife Nicole Brown and her friend Ronald Goldman both found with brutal stab marks. Unfortunately, all his glory days now brought to an end, he went from playing on the field to begging for his freedom when becoming the main suspect of their murders. Since this trial has not only altered the way Americans viewed celebrities, but it also racially divided society,
It took the jury four hours to determine this fact. Since this case was highly publicized, this case made many Americans question the quality of the criminal justice system since everything was pointing to Simpson however he was considered not guilty. A whole year and twenty days pass before we hear the next thing in this case. A civil trial meets to see if Simpson should be held financially liable for what happened at his house. It took the jury forty-one days to hear all one hundred and one witnesses’ statements and they came to an agreement the Simpson did kill Nicole and Ronald with oppression and malice. After the civil trial meet the verdict became once again widely debated amongst the legal experts and the public
The New York Times bestseller book titled Reasonable Doubts: The Criminal Justice System and the O.J. Simpson Case examines the O.J. Simpson criminal trial of the mid-1990s. The author, Alan M. Dershowitz, relates the Simpson case to the broad functions and perspectives of the American criminal justice system as a whole. A Harvard law school teacher at the time and one of the most renowned legal minds in the country, Dershowitz served as one of O.J. Simpson’s twelve defense lawyers during the trial. Dershowitz utilizes the Simpson case to illustrate how today’s criminal justice system operates and relates it to the misperceptions of the public. Many outside spectators of the case firmly believed that Simpson committed the crimes for which he was charged for. Therefore, much of the public was simply dumbfounded when Simpson was acquitted. Dershowitz attempts to explain why the jury acquitted Simpson by examining the entire American criminal justice system as a whole.
On June 12,1994, Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman were murdered. Their bodies were discovered outside Nicole Simpson's condominium. Nicole Simpson was the estranged wife of the famous football player and T.V. star O.J. Simpson.
Black Americans make up about 12% of the US population and they account for more then 30% of all arrests, 44% of all prisoners and 40% of prisoners on death row (Hunt, 1999:74). The racial problem exists in many forms within the criminal justice system and most of this racial disparity can be attributed to the practices of the prosecution and more particularly the police. The unequal treatment of blacks within the justice system becomes evident through various forms of police misconduct such as excessive use of force against blacks, harassment, planting and falsifying evidence and police perjury. Most of these issues were brought to question in the criminal court case against O. J. Simpson, who was arrested and charged with the murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald L. Goldman. The question of race was addressed in the high profile court case of O.J. Simpson when Simpson's lawyer, Johnnie Cochran took a Critical Race Theory position in defence of his client (Aylward, 1999:68).
It was the night of June 12, 1994, a woman and her long time male friend are murdered in cold blood. The victims, Nicole Brown Simpson, her neck cut so savagely it was almost severed from her body and Ronald Goldman, stabbed repeatedly, nearly 30 times. The accused, her ex-husband and football star, Orenthan James Simpson, better known as O.J. Simpson. During the trial, a trial that consisted of 150 witnesses, lasted 133 days and cost in the ball park of 15 million dollars, there were many questions asked and even more questions left unanswered (Douglas).
A crime being committed is the first event to initiate our criminal justice system. On June 12th 1994 a double murder was reported at the residence of Nicole Brown Simpson the ex-wife of the then beloved Orenthal James (OJ) Simpson. It was discovered that Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman had been brutally murdered and the Los Angeles Police Department (LAPD) began their investigation, this being the second step in our criminal justice system.
The OJ Simpson case was all over the news, which made it difficult to avoid thinking or talking about. The trial alone lasted for almost a year, during which people across the country were divided mainly along racial lines. The media was also a big influencer in peoples’ inability to see OJ as a murderer. Especially for African Americans, his life was an example of the American dream. He was a Hall of Fame NFL running back, a Heisman trophy winner, charming, and widely-known, which made it difficult to believe he could give it all up for murder. He was a role model for many African Americans, while many whites thought there was no way he couldn’t have done it. I do believe that the media could have swayed the outcome of the verdict. Many media outlets exposed problems with policing, the racism of some LAPD officers, and caused even more tension between police and the black community, which had lasting effects even after the trial. As an African American juror, one may have felt a responsibility to ensure that OJ was freed, either because of race alone, or because they thought that the evidence did not incriminate him, especially with the many investigative errors. Whatever the case, this was one of the biggest media-involved cases that will never be
The trial of O.J Simpson, an infamous case that had america glued to their Tv’s. Tensions were high as 11 months passed as the verdict was nearing. The case goes as following, O.J was accused of the murder of his ex wife Nicole Simpson and Ronald Goldman. On June 13, 1994 Nicole Brown and Ronald Goldman were found dead around midnight near the entryway of Nicole’s apartment complex. The crime was heinous for the times and took America by storm. With O.J being a famous main suspect, the media wanted to give as much insight about the trial to the people watching at home and the first amendment gives them that right to gather intel. At first the media was not allowed to share what was happening in the trial. But later on, judge Ito later gave the media permission to cover the trial as long as the media does not disclose the insight of the grand jury. To coincide with this, the media wanted access to the preliminary hearings. Several news organizations requested access to photographs of the crime and transcripts of conferences held in the judge’s office. A lot of this information was sensitive material that was still being decided upon whether to reveal to the jury, but the media still wanted to have
**Lynch, Michael J. and Patterson, Britt, Race and Criminal Justice (New York: Harrow and Heinstien, 1991)
Things only got worse when it was alleged that he transported and planted one the gloves on the Simpson estate, and the defendants legal team stating the officer wanted to frame Simpson because he was black and he disliked blacks an considering the jury was made up of mostly minorities this helped O.JSimpson even more.(2015) The key to winning a case apart from collecting evidence there must be a clear way to paint a picture that the people of the jury can understand whether or not you done the crime one must be convincing. Even though Simpson’s blood was on majority of the evidence collected it was argued that he was framed along with the contamination of evidence even if he had done it his team used all the weaknesses exposed by police involved in the case to paint a picture of innocence to the jury which proves perception of wrongdoing as persuasive to a jury as actual wrongdoing. I am sure with O.J Simpson being acquitted of the charges left a bad taste in the mouth of both police and some people in the legal field. There were too many mistakes made by the people that were tasked with the duty of collecting evidence and also in the department of how the evidence was handled but there are many lessons to be learned in every mistake the obvious one would be to not make the same ones
In 1994 Nicole Brown and her friend Ron Goldman were both found dead in the courtyard of her condominium. They both had been stabbed profusely; with Nicole’s husband Orenthal James Simpson, NFL star, seeming to be the killer. O.J. displayed some very suspicious behavior to the police. There had been past incidents of him being to physical with her and threatening her life which came to a shock to the country. To Most before this incident he was seen as a role model and look up to by many. O.J. Simpson had showed little to no emotion or concern once he found out about her death, and he showed no surprise when they said he was a suspect ("101 PIECES"). It shocked the country at first to see that O.J. Simpson could possibly
Simpson murder trial, there are a couple of things that piqued my interests. One was the notorious car chase down the Los Angeles freeway in a white Ford Bronco driven by AL Cowlings with O.J. Simpson hiding in the back. Robert Shapiro was supposed to surrender his client to the Los Angeles Police Department, but instead it is my opinion that O. J. Simpson lawyers and friends came up with a plan to get publicity and supporters. The second was the most crucial point of the trial is when O.J. Simpson squeeze his hand into the leather glove that was linked to the killings. This led to the famous argument by Johnnie Cochran “If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit.” As the years passed by many untold stories are revealed. A recent new documentary states that “Simpson had stop talking his arthritis medicine two weeks” in advance so his hands would be swollen to persuade the jury of his innocents.
Fairchild, H. & Cowan, G (1997). Journal of Social Issues. The O.J. Simpson Trial: Challenges to Science and Society.