That night at dinner, Gus said to Marje Everett, “Fuhrman’s life has become disposable. They’ve turned him into the most reviled man in America. They have ruined him.”
“If I still had Hollywood Park, I’d hire Mark Fuhrman in a second to head up security,” said Marje.
Gus attended the opera with Annabelle Begelman, whose husband had recently committed suicide, but he spent the entire performance of The Flying Dutchman writing notes about the trial in his green leather notebook for his “Letter from Los Angeles,” which was due the following day. At intermission, he remained in his seat when Annabelle went to the ladies’ room.
“Hi, Gus.”
Gus looked up and saw Bernard Lafferty. “Oh, Bernard, hello,” said Gus, standing up and shaking hands. “You look very smart, very proper. I can remember when everyone in New York wore black-tie to the opera. The only thing missing on you are those beautiful diamond studs you were wearing the last time I saw you all dressed up.”
“Oh, yes,” said Bernard.
“I told Elizabeth the diamonds were so big they looked like Doris Duke’s earrings,” said Gus.
“They were,” said Bernard. “Miss Duke gave them to me before she died. It was Miss Duke who said they’d be beautiful studs.”
“And where are they, Bernard?” asked Gus.
Tears filled his eyes. “Do you remember Andrew?”
“Andrew?”
“Andrew Cunanan.”
“The one I met at the Starks’?” asked Gus.
“And the reopening of the Beverly Hills Hotel,” replied Bernard. “He always said you never recognized him.”
“What about him?” asked Gus.
“He skipped town. He was staying at Falcon Lair for a couple of weeks,” said Bernard.
“He skipped town with the earrings?” asked Gus.
“Studs,” corrected Bernard.
“I mean studs,” said Gus.
“Yes. There were so many things he could have taken that I wouldn’t have minded losing, or missed so much, but Miss Duke gave me those herself. It was at the house in Newport. She was in bed, and she had all her jewels out in front of her, and she said, ‘I want Oatsie to have this,’ and ‘I want C.Z. to have this,’ and ‘I want you to have my earrings, Bernard. They’ll make the most divine studs.’ ”
“And the trick walked off with them, huh?” said Gus.
“If you want to know the truth, Gus, I’m glad he’s gone. He was beginning to make me nervous. This is probably not a very nice thing to say, but I really don’t think Andrew is a very nice person. I mean, some of the things he said.”
“I could have told you that the first time I saw the guy,” said Gus. “There was something peculiar about the way he was looking at Ray Stark’s Monet. He wasn’t responding to the beauty of the water lilies, or the brush strokes, or the blue of the water. He was responding to the worth of it. His face had a covetous look.”
“Covetous is a good word to describe Andrew,” said Bernard. “He wants things, and if he doesn’t get them, he could become very nasty.”
“Now that you’re so rich, Bernard, you have to be careful who you hang out with,” said Gus. “It’s been in all the papers that the Duke estate paid you five million dollars outright and a half-a-million-a-year income for life. Get real, Bernard. You’re a sitting target for guys like Andrew Cunanan.”
26
In his “Letter from Los Angeles,” Gus wrote:
I never thought it would end this way for O. J. Simpson, winning and losing concurrently, with the loss somehow exceeding the win. I had always thought it would be a hung jury. My jaw dropped—in case anyone didn’t notice it on television—when the verdict was read. There were hosannas to my left, where the Simpson supporters sat; there were tears to my right, where the Goldman and Brown families sat. Simpson was a free man. When he arrived back at the gates of his Brentwood estate to restart his life, a party was in preparation. Crates of champagne were delivered. His mother, Eunice, pretty in pink, arrived in a Rolls-Royce. The crowds cheered. It was all on television, like a premiere. Women in pink pantsuits waved champagne toasts to the media. Everyone hugged. The ever-loyal Al Cowlings was there. The ever-loyal Don Ohlmeyer, the president of NBC West Coast, was there. The ever-loyal Robert Kardashian was there. As was Larry Schiller, the coauthor of Simpson’s best-selling jailhouse book, I Want to Tell You. Jubilation reigned.
No one in the courtroom was more stunned by the acquittal of O. J. Simpson than Gus Bailey. The day before, when word came that the jury had arrived at a verdict after less than four hours of deliberation, Gus, who had always predicted a hung jury, said to his editor, Wayne Lawson, “They’re going to convict, I know. I know.” Even when he watched his friends Ira Reiner and Jack Ford on NBC predict an acquittal, he was sure they were wrong. The next morning in court, when he watched Jason Simpson lose total control of himself as he sobbed lying on the floor in front of his mother and sister, Gus was even more certain that the jurors were going to convict. “There’s no way they can acquit him,” whispered Gus to Shoreen. Shoreen didn’t answer. They sat next to each other, as they had for the entire trial, speaking in whispers, like people in church waiting for the service to begin.
“Look at Jason,” said Gus. “I never saw a guy cry that hard. He must know something we don’t know. I bet he knows the verdict. I bet Jex told him the verdict. Jex would know. That’s why he’s crying like that. His rich daddy’s going to go to prison for life.”
“You can never predict a jury, Gus,” said Shoreen.
“I know. They fool you every time,” said Gus. “Steve Barshop told me that once. He was the prosecutor in Lefty Flynn’s trial.”
“I’m worried about Kim,” said Shoreen, looking past Gus to the Goldman family on his other side.
“So am I,” said Gus.
“I hope she doesn’t scream out or anything.”
“Jex will throw her out of the courtroom if she does, sister of the victim or not,” said Gus.
“She has to get away after this, or she’s going to have a breakdown,” said Shoreen. “The strain is too much.”
“Fred, too,” said Gus. “I’m worried about Fred, that he might do something crazy.”
At one minute before ten o’clock, the deputies escorted Simpson from the holding room into the courtroom. For an instant, he looked at his daughter, his son, his first wife, his mother, his sisters, and his brother-in-law, who were all looking back at him.
“Everybody stand,” said Jex.
Judge Ito entered the courtroom and took his place.
The moment was at hand. Gus reached over and squeezed Kim Goldman’s hand.
“I’m panicked,” she whispered
“So am I,” whispered Gus.
“Counsel, is there anything else we need to take up before we invite the jury to join us?” asked Ito.
The answer was no.
The jury entered. Everyone stared at them. They looked straight ahead, revealing nothing. “None of them looked over at O. J.,” Gus whispered to no one.
“Madam Foreperson, would you please open the envelope and check the condition of the verdict forms,” instructed Ito.
She did so.
“Are they the same forms you signed, and are they in order?”
“Yes, they are.”
“If there is any disruption during the reading of the verdicts, the bailiffs will have the obligation to remove any persons disrupting these proceedings,” said Ito, looking out at the spectators in the courtroom.
“Mr. Simpson,” said Judge Ito, “would you please stand and face the jury.”
“Mrs. Robertson,” said Ito to Deirdre Robertson, the court clerk, cuing her to read. As if she was shocked by what she was about to read, Robertson stumbled in her pronunciation of the name Orenthal. “Orenfal,” she said, and then corrected herself.
“We the jury in the above-entitled action find the defendant, Orenthal James Simpson, not guilty of the crime of murder in
violation of Penal Code Section one eighty-seven A, a felony, upon Nicole Brown Simpson, a human being, as charged in count one of the information,” read Deirdre Robertson.
A gasp sounded in the courtroom.
Mrs. Robertson continued to read. “We the jury find the defendant, Orenthal James Simpson, not guilty of the crime of murder … upon Ronald Lyle Goldman, a human being.”
Later, for weeks, even months, people Gus knew said to him, “I’ll never forget the look on your face at the time of the verdict.” Strangers on the street said to him, “Your face was how we felt.” He looked to the right at Fred Goldman and Kim, who had become his Mends. Their faces were twisted in agony, their bodies racked with pain. It was a moment so private and personal to them that he had to look away. He turned to his left, to Shoreen Maghame. “What did she say?” he whispered to her, as if he might have misheard the clerk, with his partially deaf ear.
“Not guilty, both counts,” said Shoreen.
“I can’t believe it,” he said.
“Are you all right, Gus? You’re not having a heart attack, are you?” asked Shoreen.
“No.” He looked over at the defense table at O. J. Simpson, who had fulfilled his slain wife’s prophecy. “He is going to kill me, and he is going to get away with it because he is O. J. Simpson,” Nicole had said to her mother, to her sisters, to her friends, to nearly everyone she knew. To no avail. Gus interpreted the look on the acquitted man’s face as a smirk, another game won. Johnnie Cochran embraced him from behind. In front of him, Robert Kardashian’s face seemed to register blatant disbelief that such a thing could have happened, while F. Lee Bailey glowed with victorious pleasure as he stamped his cowboy boots on the floor of the courtroom. Gus felt revulsion at what he was watching.
Simpson looked over at the Goldman family and smiled.
“You fucking murderer,” said Kim, as people around her tried to calm her down.
“The defendant,” said Ito, “having been acquitted of both charges … is ordered … released forthwith.”
Gus looked over at juror number three, on whom he had counted so heavily for a hung jury. Then he watched juror number six raise his hand in the black-power salute as he left the courtroom. Without looking down at his pad, he wrote on it, “That’s all this trial was ever about. That juror, Lon Cryer, a former Black Panther, just said it all with that gesture in this courtroom.”
Still numb with disbelief, Gus stood up to leave the courtroom. The Goldmans had already been escorted out by members of the prosecution team, as had the Browns. The aisles were full of people. The entrance was clogged. The movement toward the exit was slow. As he neared the door, he turned back to look for the last time at the courtroom where he had sat each day for nearly a year. I won’t miss this place, he thought. There, standing at their seats watching people leave the courtroom, were Shirley and Benny Baker and Carmelita Durio. Of late, since their conversation in the corridor the week before, they had all dropped their eyes when they passed one another. Gus turned around and walked back into the courtroom.
“Where are you going?” asked Jex.
Gus pushed past him without speaking and walked over to where the Simpson sisters were standing. They looked at one another. Unlike Johnnie Cochran and F. Lee Bailey, they had the class not to gloat in their victory. He shook hands with each.
“I know this is a very joyous moment for you,” said Gus.
“Thank you, Gus,” said Shirley.
For an instant they looked at one another. They would probably never see one another again. They all knew that.
“Well, good-bye, and good luck,” said Gus.
“Good luck to you, Gus,” said Benny.
Outside the courtroom, Art Harris of CNN said, “Gus, let me grab you for a minute to go on CNN. Susan Rooks is on live.”
“No,” said Gus. “I want to go to Gil Garcetti’s press conference. I want to hear what Marcia and Chris have to say.”
“It’s not going to start for fifteen minutes,” said Art. “You’ll be back in time.”
“It’s not a good idea, Art,” said Gus. “I’m not myself. I haven’t quite absorbed this yet, what just happened in there. I still can’t believe he’s been acquitted.”
“It’s just across the way at Camp O. J. It’s all set up and ready to go. We’ll just have the soundman put the mike on you,” said Art, as he led Gus. They went down in the elevator in silence, out the door of the courthouse. The crowds outside were cheering at the verdict
“I don’t think I can do this, Art,” said Gus. “Look at these people. They’re ecstatic.”
“There he is, there’s the writer!” shouted a woman in the crowd. Gus turned and looked at her. She was African-American, past middle age, and her eyes were filled with loathing as she met Gus’s look. “Hey, Gus, what do you think now?”
“This is not a good idea, Art,” said Gus.
Art took hold of Gus’s arm and propelled him through the crowds to the CNN platform.
“There’s no monitor here on the CNN platform,” said Art. “You won’t be able to see Susan Rooks. She’s in Washington. Greta Van Susteren and Roger Cossack are on with her at the moment.”
“Greta Van Susteren!” exclaimed Gus. “She must be thrilled with the news.”
“Joining us from Los Angeles, where he has just been in the courtroom, is writer Augustus Bailey, the special correspondent for Vanity Fair magazine. Can you hear me, Gus?”
“Yes, Susan.”
“What do you think? Tell us firsthand.”
“What I think is that the jury is a disgrace, an absolute disgrace,” said Gus. His voice was strident. “They just gave the middle finger to justice. They did not even bother to deliberate. They ignored ten months’ worth of testimony. They have just acquitted a guilty man. That’s what I think, Susan.”
“How do you account for it?” asked Susan.
“I think the Fuhrman tapes had a great deal to do with it,” said Gus. “Those N words on Laura Hart McKinny’s tapes were manna from heaven for the defense. But those tapes had nothing whatever to do with the murders of Nicole Brown and Ronald Goldman, which this trial was supposed to have been about.”
“I don’t think the tapes were manna from heaven,” said Roger Cossack in Washington. He began to elaborate his theory about the tapes, but Gus had stopped listening. I don’t give a flying fuck what you think, thought Gus, but he said nothing.
Then Gus heard Greta Van Susteren. She spoke in a complacent tone, clearly indicating her belief that the jury had arrived at the correct verdict. “The jury has spoken,” she said. “The jury has given its message to the L.A.P.D.”
The rage that Gus had felt since the acquittal erupted. “Giving a message to the L.A.P.D. was not what the jury’s job was in this courtroom!” he shouted from Los Angeles. “There are two dead people here who seem to have been forgotten.” He could hear the anger in his voice and feel rage building up inside him. He looked over at Art Harris, who was watching him nervously.
Just then roars of derision went up from the crowds on the street behind Gus. He turned to watch a cadre of a hundred police officers march in front of the courthouse to keep order in the crowds. Shouts of booing and jeering from the crowds on the sidewalk filled the air and momentarily drowned out the audio on the television hookup with Susan Rooks in Washington. There was unadulterated hatred for the police in the ugly booing.
Gus pointed at the scene on the street behind him and shouted into the camera at Van Susteren, “That’s what your message from the jury to the L.A.P.D. is all about.”
“This man is an anarchist,” said Van Susteren.
“I don’t have to take this crap,” said Gus. When she used the word anarchist the second time, he pulled the microphone off his striped tie and yanked the hearing device out of his ear and threw them at the camera, as if he was throwing it in Van Susteren’s face.
“I’m sorry, Art, if I let you down, but I can’t stand that mealy-mouthed talk of Greta
’s about the jury giving its message to the police, like it’s a wonderful thing they’ve done,” said Gus. “They have acquitted a guilty man. That’s all they’ve done. I’m going back to Garcetti’s press conference. I wish I hadn’t come here.”
“Do you want me to go with you, Gus?” said Art. “The crowd is sort of hostile out there.”
“They’re just booing the police still,” replied Gus. “No, I’m okay. I have this terrible desire to cry. I had no idea this verdict would affect me so much. You know what Art? This is my swan song. This is my last trial. I can’t do this anymore. The bad guys always win.”
Gus moved away from the CNN platform and headed across the street back to the courthouse. As he got to the steps leading to the courthouse, the same woman who had shouted at him before began to shout at him again. “We heard what you said. We heard what you said on CNN,” she screamed at him.
“Just keep walking, Gus. Don’t answer her,” said one of the television cameramen whom Gus knew only by sight. “There’s a TV set over there by the steps that they were watching you on just now.”
“Thanks,” said Gus.
The woman kept up her shouting at Gus. “There’s the writer. There’s the writer. There’s Gus Bailey, the special correspondent for Vanity Fair. Oh, how fancy!” She pronounced every word distinctly.
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