APRIL 3 - The next phase of the trial began as prosecutors started to present the scientific evidence that they say links O.J. Simpson to the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman.
Criminalist Dennis Fung started testifying about the painstaking process of collecting blood stains and other evidence. He explained for the jury how the evidence is collected, catalogued and stored.
The prosecution has said that DNA evidence ties Simpson to the murders. The evidence includes blood stains in Simpson's Bronco and on a pair of socks in his bedroom. Prosecutors say the stains match the blood of Nicole Simpson. They also say tests found blood from Goldman in the Bronco and on the glove found beside Simpson's house.
The defense is expected to challenge the reliability of the evidence.
Meanwhile, prosecutor Marcia Clark denied knowing anything about a police videotape taken at Simpson's estate the day after the murders. She said the first time she ever saw the video photographer was last week when he testified in court about the videotape.
"I didn't even know they were doing that," said Clark, adding that if she had known about a videotape, she would have been "delighted" because she could have used it as part of her case.
Police testified the videotape was put into a drawer and forgotten. Police officers testified the tape had nothing to do with the criminal investigation of the murders. Instead it was to protect authorities from potential civil claims for property damage or loss.
"I have before me a defendant's request for sanctions including monetary sanctions," Judge Lance Ito said before scheduling arguments on the motion for Tuesday.
Defense attorney Johnnie Cochran Jr. asked to call Clark as a witness, but Judge Ito said that was unnecessary and she could address him as an officer of the court.
At one point during the hearing, the judge told the lawyers to focus on several questions regarding the videotape.
"All I'm interested in is: What happened to the tape? Why did it disappear? When did it come to light? How did it come to light? Who knew it existed, and when?" the judge said.
Detective Adalberto Luper testified that he took possession of the tape from a videographer on June 14, put it in a desk drawer and then a Simpson case file cabinet and did not remember it until February. He said he located the tape in March and then the discovery was reported to the city attorney's office, whose lawyers are the Police Department's legal counsel.
APRIL 4 - Criminalist Dennis Fung testified about the series of blood and other stains recovered from O.J. Simpson's Bronco on June 14, two days after the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman.
Fung detailed for the jury how he collected the evidence from the car's steering wheel, carpet, instrument panel and a console.
Meanwhile, Judge Lance Ito annnounced a step that he hopes will speed up the trial. He said that the legal wrangling over motions and other issues - outside of the presence of the jury - will take place at the end of testimony each day.
The judge also issued sanctions against prosecutors. He told jurors that the prosecution had wrongfully mentioned an airline ticket and a luggage tag unlawfully seized by police at Simpson's home. He told the jury to disregard the statements. He also ordered prosecutors to prepare an inventory of every videotape relevant to the case in their possession, or in the possession of police or any other agency. The decision came after the defense complained that a police videotape made on June 13 had been withheld until March 28.
APRIL 5 - Criminalist Dennis Fung conceded that investigators made mistakes at the murder scene that had possibly contaminated some crucial physical evidence in the case.
Fung made the admissions during a grueling cross-examination by defense attorney Barry Scheck. Scheck's questioning focused on how evidence was collected at the murder scene and from O.J. Simpson's estate.
Meanwhile, a sixth juror was dismissed, leaving only six remaining alternates for the trial that still has months to go.
Judge Lance Ito removed a 38-year-old black woman who works as an employment interviewer and lives in Inglewood. It is believed that she had a past experience with domestic violence that she failed to report during jury selection. She was replaced on the jury by a 44-year-old black woman from South Central Los Angeles. She is employed as a computer technician.
The latest change does not alter the ethnic makeup of the jury. It has nine women and three men; eight are black, three white and one Hispanic.
In a television interview, the juror, Jeanette Harris, said she believes the trial will end in a hung jury. "The prosecution to me, from what I've seen so far, is just spinning wheels," she said. "They're not necessarily saying anything, but they're saying a whole lot of nothing."
Scheck questioned Fung on a number of topics. For instance, he asked why Simpson's Bronco was not sealed off with the usual crime scene tape. He also asked why a second criminalist was not assigned to the case - one for the Bundy scene and one for Rockingham. Fung said he asked Detective Philip Vannatter for a second team but that Vannatter said it wasn't necessary. Fung then testified that he thought it was better to have only one team of criminalists to maintain a single chain of custody of the evidence.
In trying to show that mistakes resulted in the contamination of evidence, Scheck focused on a blanket that was used to cover Nicole Brown Simpson's body.
Scheck asked whether the blanket could have carried hairs or fibers that could have been transferred to the victims when the blanket was spread out over the crime scene. The defense suggested that Simpson could have left one of his hairs on the blanket while at Nicole Simpson's home.
When asked if it was a "terrible mistake" for a detective to use the blanket, Fung said it would depend on how clean it was.
"Well, if you had no idea how clean the blanket was, wouldn't it still be a terrible mistake to bring a blanket from inside the house right into the middle of a crime scene?" Scheck asked.
"I would prefer that it was not done," Fung said.
Fung also said he "questioned the judgment" of Detective Tom Lange, who asked the criminalist to bring a glove found at Simpson's home into the middle of the bloody crime scene at Bundy to be compared to a glove found near the bodies.
"I knew there was a danger of cross-contamination," Fung said. "I did have some concern, and I drew a line where I would not take the glove out of the bag."
Scheck also pressed Fung about letting criminalist Andrea Mazzola collect most of the blood evidence. "Would it be fair to call her a rookie in processing crime scenes?" he asked.
The prosecution objected to the use of the term rookie. Judge Ito sustained the objection. "There have been rookies of the year who have been MVPs," the judge said.
APRIL 6 - The trial was thrown into turmoil as three jurors got sick, and Judge Lance Ito ordered an investigation into a dismissed juror's comments about possible juror misconduct.
And defense lawyer Johnnie Cochran suggested that there is a campaign to remove pro-defense jurors from the panel. He also said defense witnesses have been followed and harassed and suggested that someone is targeting jurors for misconduct allegations in order to affect the trial's outcome.
"We think that Big Brother is doing more than just watching us on this case," he said, during a press conference. "We are very, very concerned about what seems to be a concerted effort to go after certain jurors on this case."
He said the defense doesn't want a mistrial and, if it becomes necessary, he would accept a verdict from fewer than 12 jurors.
The defense also filed a motion accusing prosecutors of misconduct. The defense alleges that prosecutor Rockne Harmon, or someone working on his behalf, eavesdropped or intercepted privileged communications between defense attorneys and their experts.
"They've been followed to scientific meetings they have attended over the last few months, and there has been a history of this kind of conduct, particularly on the part of some of the members of the prosecution team," defense attorney Peter Neufeld said.
In response to the allegations, Los Angeles District Attorney Gil Garcetti said, "We are seeking the truth and we're doing it in an ethical, professional and honorable way."
The furor over the jury stemmed from statements by Jeannette Harris. She was dismissed from the panel on Wednesday because she failed to disclose on her jury questionnaire that she had an incident of domestic violence in her past.
In a 1988 court document involving a child custody dispute, Harris said her husband Melvin "forcibly made me have sex with him" and "pushed and shoved me." She expressed fear in the document that the abuse would get even more violent. She said Thursday that the dispute was settled and forgotten about. She is still married to Melvin Harris.
Harris told a television station that jurors had the chance to talk about the case with friends and relatives during unmonitored phone calls. She also claimed that jurors were discussing the case among themselves and that there was racial tension within the jury. She also accused the sheriffs' deputies of contributing to the racial split. Harris also said she was not convinced of Simpson's guilt by what the prosecution has presented so far, and predicted the case would end in a hung jury.
Judge Ito has repeatedly cautioned the jurors not to discuss any aspects of the case among themselves or with anyone else. He must now decided whether the jurors can still be fair and impartial.
Deputy John Castro of the Sheriff's Department denied the allegation that deputies were contributing to any problem.
In the only ruling of the day, Judge Ito decided the defense could show a videotape which purportedly shows a key piece of evidence, a leather glove, lying on a blood-stained blanket at the murder scene. The defense claims the glove was moved at the crime scene.
APRIL 7 - The trial was in recess for a second day due to the illness of three jurors. The trial is scheduled to resume on Tuesday. Judge Lance Ito has other obligations on Monday.
Meanwhile, Judge Ito rejected a defense effort to challenge the admissibility of DNA evidence. And in another ruling, he said the defense could question the coroner in the case, Dr. Erwin Golden, about mistakes he had made in the past. But the judge ruled the defense could not question Golden about allegations that he took a gun to work, waved a gun around or threatened to kill lawyers.
