This Tuesday’s episode of FX’s “The People v. O.J. Simpson” will feature one of the most notorious episodes from the murder trial — the testimony of LAPD Detective Mark Fuhrman. Fuhrman found the infamous bloody glove on Simpson’s property and gave key testimony. He later pleaded no contest to a perjury charge stemming from his false claim on the stand that he had not used a racial slur in the past decade. The defense had cited his use of an epithet to suggest the glove was planted. Now 64, Fuhrman is a crime analyst, an expert for cable news and author of several true-crime books, including “Murder in Brentwood,” his 1997 best-seller about the Simpson case. He spoke to The Post about the television series and the case.
You refuse to watch “The People v. O.J. Simpson.”
The last 20 years, I have watched the facts dismissed by the media, journalists and the public simply because it does not fit within the politically correct narrative. At this late date, FX is attempting to establish a historical artifact with this series without reaching out to any prosecution sources. In a time when Americans read less and less and investigative journalism is on vacation, it is sad that this movie will be the historical word on this infamous trial. After all, it was “based on a true story.”
This miniseries will most probably define not the historical record of the murder of two people, but the almost pathological desire to elevate a narcissistic, violent man to victim status just because he was a black athlete. Immensely sad. I am angry and bitter because the truth is a massaged reality. Let’s play grownup for a while. This is not about me. There will be another O.J., and what we have learned is that political correctness and stupidity trump justice.
You and Brad Roberts were the only detectives at the scene who found any evidence, including the glove. Yet Roberts is not mentioned in “The People v. O.J. Simpson” and was never called to testify. Why?
The simple answer is that the lead detective, Phil Vannatter, stole the credit for Roberts’ discoveries. Right under the nose of the so-called investigative journalists sits Detective Brad Roberts, yet in 20-plus years, not one journalist has even attempted to contact Brad.
In July 1994, in the preliminary hearing, I testified about discoveries that Roberts had made at the Bundy and Rockingham [crime] scenes, yet [prosecutor] Marcia Clark failed to follow up on my responses. Why? That first day at Rockingham [Simpson’s estate], Clark showed up at the scene and, at my direction, Roberts walked her through the scene and showed her all the evidence that he and I had found, including black sweats in the washing machine and blood smears in the laundry-room wall/light-switch cover. Vannatter’s name was never mentioned.
By the time Vannatter shut down the Rockingham scene, he managed to leave the sweats in the washing machine, the blood on the wall, an empty knife box in the master bath, blood drops on the driveway and allowed the white Bronco to sit on the street while the media used it as a coffee table.
In a nutshell, Vannatter lied about his observations. He perjured himself. Roberts wrote a two-page letter to the prosecutor in charge of the case, Bill Hodgman, and in that letter he described what really happened at Rockingham and just who found what evidence. Vannatter found not one piece of evidence. When Clark put Vannatter on the stand and he claimed that he found the blood in the Bronco, she knew that was a lie, because Roberts was the one who walked her through the scene that very first day.
Personally, I am concerned with only one aspect of this investigation and subsequent trial. Where were the journalists? Was everyone so blinded by the juicy racial diet that they were blinded to facts?
If you had to choose one overriding piece of evidence that was either overlooked or never introduced by the prosecution, what would that be?
There is not one, but three pivotal pieces of evidence:
1. The bloody fingerprint on the side gate lock at Bundy [Nicole Brown’s residence]. Roberts first saw this, [and] I saw it, as did Detective [Tom] Nolan. All of us agree that it was a high-quality print, many points for reference. The fingerprint was clearly described in my initial crime-scene notes.
2. The empty knife box sitting on the edge of the master-bedroom bathtub. This Swiss Army knife box contained a 4-inch lock-back blade. Simpson was a spokesperson for Victorinox Swiss Army knives and had within just days traveled back East to the factory and left with a dozen knives; at least one was this type 4-inch lock-back. In the limo drive from the factory to the airport, Simpson displayed one of these knives to the driver and stated, “You could kill somebody with one of these.” The limo driver testified in the civil trial and also took a polygraph of which he was found to be truthful. When writing “Murder in Brentwood,” I revealed the wounds to [Ron] Goldman’s body all matched the 4-inch lock-back Swiss Army knife in depth, thickness and width.
3. The black sweats in the washing machine were, almost without doubt, the clothes Simpson wore during the murders. Simpson was observed by [Kato] Kaelin wearing the sweats that night. Roberts found them, showed Marcia Clark, [and] Vannatter left them at the Rockingham scene.
The fresh-laundered clothes, coupled with the blood on the wall and light switch, tell the tale.
Are you bothered by how you are perceived by the public even more than 20 years after the trial?
“You have no idea how little I care” — Monte Walsh*. Ditto, Mark Fuhrman.
*From the movie “Monte Walsh,” about a turn-of-the-century cowboy