Get outta town! It's really going to happen. O. J. Simpson will face another criminal jury and take his chances with extralegal, mass-market manufactured perceptions, perceptions a jury is never supposed to consider during any trial and its deliberations. Except that petit juries have been doing some version of it since well before Lady Liberty was even a gleam, and they do it somewhere every day in the United States; they do it in cases no one cares or knows about unless the crime happens in their town, neighborhood or extended family.
In truth, though, the overwhelming majority of juries in the United States get it right because few questions are truly in material dispute--or the defense attorney was 'calling it in.' That's not what is happening here. Unbelievable.
This piece of surreal history repeating itself presents me with more than a few professional and personal problems--and challenges. Regular readers will know of them so I will not repeat myself here, particularly when a new reader only has to scroll down a bit and get the gist of this too public mill.
I can only speak from the gizzard at the moment: It is screaming that I must finish what I started. It then quickly whispers the question -- how often does such a thing happen in anyone's life? Rarer still to an author and journalist: another pass at getting the story right, a story that will follow him into the grave no matter what.
Holy smokes! What to do? Said the rabbit. Leave China, my home now by emotional, metaphysical inertia and the surprising solidity of the several parts of me that now approach a whole that is decidedly better than what came before? Golly goddamn, I do not know! Only stupid criminals return to the scene of the crime. Only a relatively few folks think I am a criminal (but, thanks to the Internet, they are vocal); me being stupid, on the other hand, is a very open and legitimate question.
Oh, the story of the judge's ruling that I link-to below is from the Associated Press and not my customary tip of the keyboard to The New York Times.
The reason is that the AP story is written by Linda Deutsch. She is the best trial reporter living, period. Seeing Linda, being with her, working with her again, is just about reason enough to go back to the States to cover this story. Linda was mentored by the legendary crime reporter Theo Wilson, who passed from this life the very day her long-awaited memoir was published, a year or so after the Simpson criminal trial ended (the too few hours spent listening to Theo explain how she did it in trials immemorial were invaluable to this reporter).
But, gracious, Linda is good! Many readers may not know that because her byline may not appear in their hometown newspapers that carry her file stories. But from Manson to Sirhan to Rodney King to O. J. (1 & 2) to Kimes, Petersen, Blake, Pellicano, etc., and O. J.3, she knows, but never tells; Linda, as only great storytellers come to understand, shows, she doesn't tell.
LAS VEGAS -- O.J. Simpson must face trial on kidnapping, armed robbery and other charges stemming from a suspected sports memorabilia heist, a justice of the peace ruled Wednesday, despite fierce defense attacks that characterized prosecution witnesses as con artists and crooks out for a buck.
