> they had to play the racial card and turn Mark Fuhrman into a virulent racist, which he wasn’t <
Fuhrman might be a decent man today. But back then he was no damn good. He was a racist, or he cynically pretended to be a racist to get out of working. Either way, he was an easy target for the defense. From Wikipedia:
In 1981, Fuhrman requested leave for workers’ compensation. During a psychiatric interview regarding this claim, Fuhrman expressed racist sentiments, stating that he stopped enjoying military service because of alleged insubordination from Mexican-Americans and African-Americans, whom he described as “n*ggers”. Fuhrman received workers’ compensation and remained on paid leave until 1983.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mark_Fuhrman
And in the so-called Fuhrman Tapes, Fuhrman talked about how the LAPD planted evidence. Those tapes were played at Simpson’s trial. Maybe Fuhrman was just bragging on those tapes. But again, it made him an easy target for the defense.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Fuhrman_tapes
(Sorry for the long rant. But it still bothers me that a double murderer was allowed to walk free. Fuhrman deserves a good share of the blame for that happening.)
The ability of rich guys who can buy dream teams caused this travesty of justice. Starting with insistence on minority venue location.
Van atta and Fuhrman were cops. Lots of cops in my family. Very few cops are more than 9-5 guys. It is what it is and cops with ambition are trying to get higher paying positions (for the most part). Those who work the mean streets have a good guy, bad guy attitude and that tends to show up as a racist attitude.
OJ had it all going for him. Rich, a minority, a leftist California Justice system. And too a certain degree cops and forensic experts who didn’t think the rules applied because it never had to before.
I understand your point of view, but I disagree. (NOTE: This is not against, you, but I would not use Wikipedia as a source for anything political or racial except for simple statements of dates. It isn’t reliable at all in those respects)
In those tapes he wasn’t bragging. He was trying to help a writer who he was collaborating with get a gritty street feel for her screenplay.
Nobody who ever worked with him characterized him in any respect other than positive, and that includes his black colleagues, of which there were many.
He was targeted to play the race card, plain and simple. Now I admit to having read his side of the story in his “Murder in Brentwood”, but I think context is important, and we only hear one side of it.
Agreed. The defense may have accused Fuhrman of doing things that he didn’t do, but Fuhrman opened himself up for it with his arrogant, cynical bragging on those tapes. Any cop who goes on tape saying what Fuhrman said should be fired or at least disciplined. That is EXACTLY the way that solid cases get overturned. If he really was the smart, experienced cop that his defenders claimed that he was, he should have known that.
That network had this for a dozen years during a later trial for other crimes, sentencing and parole hearings and they just sat on it.
Great citizens all about open information and getting the News out.
Oh wow, I had forgotten all that. So he was a racist after all. (Fuhrman)