TRANSCRIPTS OF OPENING STATEMENTS IN THE CIVIL TRIAL OF O.J. SIMPSON
REGINA D. CHAVEZ, OFFICIAL REPORTER
8 MR. PETROCELLI: Thank you, Your Honor.
9 On a June evening, the 12th of June,
10 1994, Nicole Brown Simpson just finished putting her
11 ten-year-old daughter, Sydney, and her six-year-old
12 son, Justin, down to bed.
13 She filled her bathtub with water. She
14 lit some candles, began to get ready to take a bath
15 and relax for the evening.
16 The phone rang. It was 9:40 p.m. Nicole
17 answered. And it was her mother, saying that she had
18 left her glasses at the restaurant nearby in
19 Brentwood, where the family had all celebrated
20 Sydney's dance recital over dinner, just an hour
21 before.
22 Nicole's mother asked if Nicole could
23 please pick up her glasses from the restaurant the
24 next day. Nicole said, of course, good-bye, and hung
25 up.
26 Nicole then called the restaurant and
27 asked to speak to a friendly young waiter there.
28 Nicole asked this young waiter if he would be kind
1 enough to drop her mother's glasses off.
2 The young man obliged and said he would
3 drop the glasses off shortly after work, on his way to
4 meet his friend in Marina Del Rey. The young man's
5 name was Ron Goldman. He was 25 year old.
6 With the glasses in hand, Ron walked out
7 of the restaurant, walked the few minutes to his
8 apartment nearby, to change. He left the restaurant
9 at 9:50 p.m.
10 After Ron changed, he got into his
11 girlfriend's car parked in his garage, and drove the
12 short distance to Nicole Brown Simpson's home at 875
13 South Bundy Drive in Brentwood.
14 Ron parked the car on the side street,
15 walked to the front of Nicole's condominium, and
16 turned up the walkway to the front gate. Just past
17 the front gate were steps leading to Nicole's
18 condominium.
19 Ronald Goldman never made it past those
20 steps. It was at that front gate that Ron spent the
21 last few savage minutes of his life. It was there
22 that his brutalized body was found next to Nicole
23 Brown Simpson's slain body, with her mother's glasses
24 lying next to him on the ground in an envelope.
25 Ron Goldman's young life ended because
26 he agreed to do a friend a favor, only to come upon
27 her rageful killer and his.
28 He might have run from danger, but he
1 did not. Ron Goldman died, ladies and gentlemen, with
2 his eyes open. And in the last furious moment of his
3 life, Ron saw through those open eyes the person who
4 killed his friend Nicole. And for that reason, he too
5 had to die.
6 And the last person Ron Goldman saw
7 through his open eyes was the man who took his young
8 life away: The man who now sits in this courtroom,
9 the defendant, Orenthal James Simpson.
10 Ladies and gentlemen, we will prove to
11 you that Ronald Lyle Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson
12 died at the hands of the defendant, Orenthal Simpson.
13 Let me again introduce myself and my
14 colleagues to you.
15 My name is Daniel Petrocelli. With me
16 are Edward Medvene, Peter Gelblum, Yvette Molinaro,
17 Thomas Lambert. We all represent the Estate of Ronald
18 Goldman and Ronald's father, Fred, in this, his last
19 fight for justice for his son.
20 Mr. Brewer represents Ronald's mother,
21 Sharon Rufo, and Mr. Kelly represents the Estate of
22 Nicole Brown Simpson. And they will each talk to you
23 after me.
24 In this trial, we will present to you
25 an extraordinary amount of evidence undeniably
26 pointing to O.J. Simpson as the person who killed
27 Ronald Goldman and Nicole Brown Simpson on the evening
28 of June 12.
1 This evidence includes:
2 Mr. Simpson's blood leaving the scene of
3 the murder at Nicole's condominium;
4 His blood dripping to the ground from the
5 fingers of his left hand;
6 Mr. Simpson's blood on the glove he wore
7 when he killed Ron and Nicole;
8 Mr. Simpson's blood in his car that he
9 used to drive from Bundy to his home at Rockingham,
10 five minutes away;
11 Mr. Simpson's blood on the driveway of
12 his home;
13 Mr. Simpson's blood inside his home;
14 Ron's blood in Mr. Simpson's car;
15 Nicole's blood in Mr. Simpson's car;
16 Ron's blood on Mr. Simpson's glove;
17 Nicole's blood on Mr. Simpson's glove;
18 Nicole's blood on the socks in
19 Mr. Simpson's bedroom;
20 Mr. Simpson's own blood on his socks;
21 Mr. Simpson's size 12 shoe prints in the
22 blood of Nicole, leaving the scene of the murder,
23 exiting towards the back of the condominium;
24 Hair matching Mr. Simpson's hair in the
25 knit cap he left behind at the scene of the murders;
26 Hair matching Mr. Simpson's hair on
27 Ronald Goldman's shirt;
28 Strands of Nicole's hair and Ron's hair
1 on the glove Mr. Simpson dropped on the side of his
2 house, trying to get onto his property so no one would
3 see him;
4 Carpet fibers, rare carpet fibers from
5 Mr. Simpson's Bronco found in the knit cap that he
6 left at the scene of the murders;
7 Matching blue-black cotton fibers found
8 on Ronald Goldman's shirt;
9 The glove at Rockingham and Mr. Simpson's
10 socks in the bedroom, tying all three together.
11 Cuts and bruises to Mr. Simpson's left
12 hand during his brief but violent attacks on Ron and
13 Nicole;
14 Cuts to this day that Mr. Simpson cannot
15 and will not explain.
16 We will prove to you that Mr. Simpson
17 has no alibi during the time when the murders were
18 committed.
19 He cannot identify a single person who
20 can account for his whereabouts during the time of the
21 murders. Not one person will take this stand and
22 testify that he or she was with Mr. Simpson or spoke
23 to Mr. Simpson during the time of these murders.
24 We will prove how Ron and Nicole were
25 killed quickly and savagely. They were defenseless
26 against a man so large, powerful, strong, armed with a
27 six-inch knife, and in a total state of rage.
28 Nicole had no chance to fight, and died
1 within moments of the gaping cut to her throat.
2 Ron tried to fight, but trapped in a
3 small, caged area, he was cut down swiftly.
4 We will prove to you that Mr. Simpson
5 committed the murders and sped back home, just in time
6 to drive to the airport and catch a plane that he
7 desperately needed to catch to have any hope of an
8 alibi. In his extreme panic and hurry, Mr. Simpson
9 left behind a trail of incriminating evidence,
10 starting right at the murder scene and leading right
11 into his bedroom.
12 We will prove to you that Mr. Simpson was
13 embroiled in a deeply emotional conflict with Nicole
14 Brown Simpson after she had just ended any last
15 attempt at reconciliation between the two.
16 We will describe to you the rejection and
17 pain this caused Mr. Simpson in detail, the build-up
18 of tension, emotion, and anger between Mr. Simpson and
19 Nicole in the last weeks and days leading up to her
20 murder.
21 We will prove that Mr. Simpson killed
22 Ronald Goldman because he would have been a witness to
23 the rageful attack and murder of Nicole, a witness who
24 would have testified in this trial, a young man who
25 simply, and frankly, happened to be at the wrong place
26 at the wrong time.
27 We will prove to you how Mr. Simpson's
28 own words and actions following the murders revealed
1 then, and still reveal today, his guilt for these
2 deaths.
3 You will hear Mr. Simpson on tape, just
4 hours after the murder, unable to explain his actions
5 the night before, during the time of the murders.
6 You will hear him make very incriminating
7 statements, statements that he will now try to
8 contradict or vary.
9 We will tell you about Mr. Simpson's
10 flight from the police when they came to arrest him
11 and his apparent thoughts of taking his life, thoughts
12 that are consistent, ladies and gentlemen, only with a
13 person who had killed, and that are totally
14 inconsistent with a man whose children had just lost
15 their mother at the hands of a stranger.
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