Do you have a dumb question that you're kind of embarrassed to ask in the main thread? Is there something you're just not sure about?
This is your opportunity to ask questions. No question too simple or too silly.
Culture war topics are accepted, and proposals for a better intro post are appreciated.
Jump in the discussion.
No email address required.
Notes -
This is a bit tangential to your actual question, but it’s a point I’ve never had the opportunity to bring up here. People forget the extreme degree to which Detective Mark Furhman wrecked the prosecution’s case. It’s often remembered and reported that he took the Fifth Amendment when he was cross-examined, but no one talks about the fact that he took the Fifth when asked if he planted evidence in that specific case. That’s huge. It’s a giant red flag to the jury when the lead murder detective won’t answer whether he literally framed the defendant. Now I suspect OJ actually did do it, and that Furhman was just paranoid about his already looming perjury charges and was just Fifth Amendment-ing everything. Or maybe he engaged in some fairly standard (at the time) touching up of the scene to strengthen the case, like moving the glove to a more incriminating location in the alley, or daubing some of the victim’s blood onto OJ’s Bronco. But if I was a juror, the fact that the lead detective can’t say whether he planted evidence is pretty much already enough reasonable doubt for me to acquit. And when you keep that in mind, a lot of Cochran’s loopier theories about preservatives in the blood samples and the glove not fitting suddenly start to sound a lot more plausible and carry a lot more weight. Please keep that in mind before thinking of the jury as a bunch of dumbasses.
Also I highly recommend Season 3 about the Monica Lewinsky scandal, I thought it was very underrated. Clive Owen should have won an Emmy for playing Bill Clinton, that’s a role that’s very difficult to play without turning it into a Saturday Night Live sketch. And Beany Feldstien might initially seem like poor casting for Lewinsky but she does an amazing job.
The jury never knew about any of that. After the tapes came out, the defense wanted to admit them to demonstrate that Fuhrman lied about his use of racial epithets and wanted to call additional witnesses who would testify to his use of them. This is an interesting story in and of itself, but the upshot is that the defense wanted to recall Fuhrman so they could cross-examine him about the newly discovered evidence. Given that the goal of such a cross-examination would be to show that Fuhrman had committed perjury, there was a strong likelihood that he would take the fifth upon being questioned about it. When the fifth is invoked in a criminal trial, the judge will instruct the jury that they can't make any negative inference from it. Courts aren't stupid, though, so if they anticipate that a witness will take the fifth, they will insist that the witness be questioned outside the presence of the jury, and if the witness indeed takes the fifth, then they won't testify in open court.
So when Fuhrman took the fifth, it wasn't during the trial proper, but during a hearing to determine whether he could be recalled. Now, if a witness intends to take the fifth, they can't answer any questions, period. If they take the fifth as to one question then start answering others, they are said to have waived the privilege. So the standard format is that the attorney will ask a few questions, the witness will assert the privilege, the attorney will then ask the witness if he intends to assert the privilege for all the questions, the witness says yes, and the questioning ends. When Gerald Uelman asked Fuhrman if he had planted evidence, Fuhrman couldn't have said no regardless of the situation.
More options
Context Copy link
More options
Context Copy link