LOS ANGELES -- You can't take your eyes off the Dream Team. Look away and you
might miss something. Last week the Dream Team produced a full-throttle
feud, an ugly thing, with friendship permanently severed -- until it was
mended in prayer in the courtroom. This was at lunch time, after the
judge and prosecutors and reporters had left. The prayer was led by
Roosevelt Grier, the former Los Angeles Rams defensive lineman. These
were the best lawyers money could buy, heads bowed. "It was very moving,
very spiritual and uplifting for all of us," said Dream Team lawyer Carl
Douglas. When the prayer was over they went downstairs and held a news
conference to tell everyone about their spiritual experience.
This happened Wednesday, with the opening statements of O.J.
Simpson's murder trial only days away. The Dream Team -- led by big-name
lawyers Robert Shapiro, Johnnie Cochran, F. Lee Bailey and Alan
Dershowitz -- had nearly been torn asunder by internal acrimony. Shapiro
had called his old friend Bailey a "snake" and said he would never again
speak to him, ride in a car with him or be photographed with him.
Shapiro suspected Bailey of leaking nasty stories about him to the
press. It was a Dream Team nightmare!
Ending the feud was not enough -- it had to be ended publicly. So
the Dream Team stood before the cameras, shoulder to shoulder. Bailey
was right next to Shapiro. Shapiro said he had put together this team
and he still believed in it. He then acknowledged what had already
become apparent in the courtroom, that Cochran was the new leader, in
charge of overall strategy: Shapiro in effect was announcing his own
demotion.
Then Johnnie Cochran, in his lavender suit, took the mike.
"To Bob's credit, he is a team player," Cochran said. The lives of
the lawyers aren't what's important, he said. What's important is that
O.J. Simpson is wrongfully accused of murdering Nicole Brown Simpson and
Ronald Goldman.
"We believe in O.J. Simpson, we believe in his innocence," Cochran
continued. "We are united in this case. We are convinced that he is
absolutely, 100 percent not guilty."
Someday the Dream Team will have a reunion, Cochran said. And O.J.
Simpson will be with them.
Then they walked away, back to court, and for all the talk of unity
it was hard not to notice that during the news conference Shapiro and
Bailey hadn't said a word to each other.
The feud would be a minor sideshow were it not for the
extraordinary nature of O.J. Simpson's defense. His legal team is
unusually big, unusually bold, unusually riveting. The lawyers have not
flinched from their central assertion: That the Los Angeles district
attorney's office has the murder all wrong, that O.J. Simpson was asleep
at home at that critical hour on June 12, that someone else butchered
the two victims. This is not a defense based on a differing
interpretation of some murky event. It's a defense based on total
refutation. They argue that their client is a wholly innocent man being
framed by malign forces.
Legal experts say the prosecution case is powerful and has gotten
stronger in recent months. But they also respect the talents of the
Dream Team. Another defendant, with lesser lawyers, might not have a
prayer.
"If this was anyone other than Mr. Simpson, represented by Johnnie
Cochran, you could say, gee, this seems like a slam dunk," says Peter
Arenella, a UCLA law professor who has followed the case closely.
Another analyst, Laurie Levenson, a Loyola University law professor,
says, "The defense has some kind of surprise up its sleeve -- and if it
doesn't, it's in trouble." That surprise could be sprung Monday when
Cochran makes his opening statement. It will be the Dream Team's biggest
moment. So far the story line has been owned by the district attorney's
office. "The people," as the prosecutors call themselves as they make
their arguments in court, assert that this is basically a
domestic-violence case, with the ultimate conclusion of murder. The
defense will vigorously contest that story line, incident by incident.
But will the defense have its own story? Will Cochran present a
narrative for who other than O.J. Simpson might have killed Simpson's
ex-wife and her friend? There have been suggestions from the defense
that it could have been a drug-related murder, a professional hit of
some kind. And Simpson's lawyers will claim that their client was
railroaded by cops who closed their minds to any other possible suspect.
The Dream Team lawyers are all well clothed, charming, smooth. They
don't squawk when they lose a round. They were thumped this week when
Judge Lance Ito said the prosecution could introduce evidence that
Simpson beat his wife for years and stalked her after their divorce. The
defense reaction: no big deal.
"It's not anything we're very much concerned with," said Cochran.
"There are witnesses who will testify that these things are not true."
People always talk of their fine suits, but it is their attitude
that makes the Dream Team lawyers so entrancing. Cochran is a bulldog
who can purr like a kitty. He's always focused. His client is innocent:
From that central assertion radiate all other interpretations of
reality. As Cochran walked into the courtroom yesterday, a reporter
asked him for his Super Bowl prediction. "Bet on Simpson and San
Francisco," he said.
They say Cochran does a cross-examination with a velvet glove; F.
Lee Bailey is more the karate chop type. Shapiro is hardly a trial
attorney at all; he's a dealmaker. He may have called his mentor Bailey
in June out of desperation to get a courtroom wizard on his team. In
Cochran he obtained a more contemporary master. Cochran always looks
like he's winning; he could be sinking in quicksand and still look as if
he owned the world. Marcia Clark, the lead prosecutor, is extremely
competent and charming herself, but with her wide-open eyes, she
sometimes looks just a little bit frantic.
Bailey is the wild card of the team. His last really big case was
the Patty Hearst debacle in the late '70s. He was criticized for letting
her take the Fifth Amendment repeatedly on the stand. Hearst was
convicted. As for Alan Dershowitz, he's been pretty much out of sight
unless you count appearances on television. Presumably he would handle
an appeal, if one were necessary.
This kind of defense -- a team of prominent lawyers, using
investigators behind the scenes, retaining expert witnesses to fight the
technical evidence -- is extremely expensive. But what hasn't been
reported is that Simpson has many allies helping pay his legal fees:
ordinary Americans.
People send money, Simpson's lawyers said this week.
"We get money every day. I get money every day," Cochran told The
Washington Post.
Robert Kardashian, a lawyer and personal friend of Simpson who has
assisted the defense team, also said people have sent money. "Whether
we've used it, I don't know. ... I know we're getting quite a bit."
Cochran said he sends all money to Leroy "Skip" Taft, Simpson's
personal business attorney. Taft is in effect the CEO of what might
fancifully be called O.J. Defense Inc. Taft is the corporate counsel for
Orenthal Productions, a company he and Simpson set up to handle
Simpson's investments. Through Orenthal Productions, Taft will manage
Simpson's book advance and royalties from "I Want to Tell You," the book
by Simpson and freelance writer Lawrence Schiller to be published soon
by Little, Brown, purportedly in response to 300,000 pieces of mail
received by Simpson since his arrest.
Taft declined numerous requests to be interviewed and would not
reveal how much money people have sent. His office is in a bank building
on San Vicente Boulevard in Brentwood, just a few doors down from the
Starbucks Coffee shop where O.J. Simpson allegedly once saw his ex-wife
sitting with Goldman and another man. A woman who works for Taft said he
never gives press interviews.
One man who has dealt with Taft in recent days is Lenward Holness,
president of CRASH Productions. That stands for Collectibles, Rarities,
Art and Special Holdings. Holness is busy these days marketing bronze
statues of Simpson. They sell for $3,395 each. Holness says he has
orders for 1,000 already; he plans a "limited edition" of 25,000. The
statues are 21 inches high and weigh 30 pounds. Simpson is shown
clutching a football and standing with one foot atop a helmet. "I call
it a very confident, heroic pose," Holness says.
Simpson will get royalties from the sales, Holness says, but he
wouldn't reveal how much. He said he's sending the money to Orenthal
Productions and has spoken to Taft twice in recent days. The defense
team, Holness said, is not hurting for money.
"No one's screaming poverty right now," he said.
Ground Zero In the last few days, with opening statements
near, there has been a media implosion at the Criminal Courts Building.
Across the street, by the old Hall of Justice, towers of scaffolding
rise from a media city, fondly known as Camp O.J. On top of the Caltrans
building, literally on the roof, a crew has put up tarps and bright
lights; that'll be Tom Brokaw's perch.
Everyone wants a piece of the Dream Teamers. The way Shapiro and
Cochran handle the cameras is awesome. A normal person would shout, "Get
away!" or simply run. Or flip a finger. The Dream Teamers just ride the
cameras as though they were a gently breaking wave. As they leave the
court building, embedded in press, Cochran and Shapiro inch along
through the parking lot, winding to and fro, answering questions
patiently, the whole gaggle of them going left and then right as though
Cochran and Shapiro hope to bump randomly into their respective
vehicles. It's not clear whether they can't see anything from inside the
pod, and thus can't find their cars, or simply enjoy the moment and are
not all that anxious for it to end.
Perhaps Monday the defense will drop the ultimate bombshell: the
name or names of people who the defense thinks might be more likely
suspects in the murders.
It was, in fact, Skip Taft who announced back in July that he would
pay $500,000 for information leading to the real killer. He set up an
800 number for tips in the case. He announced that a private
investigator had been hired to "commence a full investigation to find
evidence {leading} to the arrest and conviction of the real killer or
killers in this case."
By November, though, Taft had been forced to assign a different
investigator to track down leaks within the defense team. The
investigator reportedly concluded that Bailey or one of his associates
was the leaker. So at this point, as far as the public knows, the
defense team's private sleuthing has incriminated only a fellow member
of the Dream Team.
As for the 800 number, it is no longer receiving tips. A recording
simply states, "The 800 number you have dialed has been disconnected."
