American Crime (2015–2017): Season 1, Episode 7 - Episode Seven - full transcript

Aubry is asked to testify against Carter; a new investigator has information for Aliyah.

Good Morning Gil. Gil?
We barely recovered from the Rodney King riots two years ago,
now you and Johnnie are standing in a goddamn pool of gasoline,
playing with matches. It's all gonna happen again, it's gonna be on you.
Gil, it's me, Bob. You know who is pushing this. It's Johnnie.
Enioy your legacy, Bob.
Excuse me, excuse me, Mr. Shapiro.
Questioning Mark Furhman about the use of the N word.
Is it based on something you know or your views of the LAPD in general?
Look I...
Let me just state this. I think that
the LAPD is a terrific organization.
I think that there's just a few bad apples.
Unbelievable. Good Morning. Love the hair.
Please don't ever mention my hair again.
- Got it. - Ever.
And within hours of the killings you had my client in handcuffs.
So, what I'm trying to get a sense of,
is this rush to judgment, and how in a few
short hours, these detectives closed up shop,
on a complex investigation that could have gone in any different direction.
It might sound like Cochran is fishing but he understands what we have to do.
Present alternative theories that do not include your client.
It's not enough to just plead your client's innocence,
you need to provide,
a narrative, and not just in the court room, in the world!
Do you feel, that you've turned over every possible rock
in search for the real killer in this case
before rushing to charge my client?
I do.
Look what the culture is becoming,
the media, people they want narrative too,
but they want it to be entertainment, and what's out in the world,
osmoses back in to that courtroom. Sequestered be damned.
If there's gonna be a media circus, you better well be the ringmaster.
Yes, yes, this could work.
[fax dialing]
[fax machine whirring]
Then tell the court please why,
you refused to investigate any other possible suspects.
Objection asked and answered. Argumentative.
[judge] Sustained. Mr. Cochran, please refrain from badgering the witness.
Yes, Your Honor.
Detective Lange.
Is it possible that these,
murders could be drug related?
-[Marcia] Objection. -[judge] Sustained.
[judge] You're being a little vague, Counsel.
Detective, have you ever heard of a Columbian necktie?
A what?
- No. - Really?
It's a well-known technique employed by drug gangs.
They slash a person's throat so viciously,
they almost remove the victim's head.
[clapping and exclaiming]
[siren wailing]
Sorry about the Columbian necktie thing, I had never heard of it.
You're kidding me, Tom?
You didn't know that Mezzaluna was a cleverly disguised
front for the gatherings of cocaine Kingpins?
That Faye Resnick owed them money on some deal she was mixed up in?
And these scarfaces decided to scare her by killing Nicole?
How could you not know there's a major drug cartel
being run out of B minus Brentwood eatery right under your nose?
It's just desperate flailing.
I hope they keep that kind of unsubstantiated bullshit up.
I don't.
Like it's all stupid, but it lands.
I saw the jury.
They're theories everywhere.
And everyone loves to hear them, talk about them.
So when the defense comes in with something exotic,
it makes the jury sit up and listen
instead of playing tic-tac-toe with themselves.
Or flat out, fall asleep.
I mean we have hard evidence.
And they razzle dazzle a bunch of
conspiracy nonsense in the big moments.
Now we need to make our own big moments that land with the jury.
That's how we beat the nonsense.
Now, can we focus on that?
Okay, yeah.
Sure, we'll see what we can find.
Please. Thank you.
I'm sorry.
- I hijacked the meeting. - No, that's okay.
I liked it.
Johnnie.
Why do you think there hasn't been a realistic theory about who did it?
Or any evidence.
I mean, I know it's what we're saying, but
I have trouble with the blood in the Bronco,
that Fuhrman, or anyone, planted all of it.
We've got O.J.'s, Nicole's and Goldman's?
Bobby...
We don't have the whole police force out there, chasing leads,
we got to be patient.
The truth will find us. It always does.
[door opening]
There's something on the TV. I think you better see it.
Can't you record it?
Johnnie, Barbara is on A CurrentAffair.
With Patricia, both of them.
[woman] Patricia, you took Johnnie? name even though he never married you.
Guys! guys'
Well, it seemed unfair for our boy Johnnie Junior
not to have his own father's name.
[woman] Barbara, were you aware of Johnnie's double life?
Maybe unconsciously.
I loved him too much to acknowledge it.
[woman] He must have been under a lot of pressure.
Running back and forth between two households.
Johnnie makes it all look easy.
He is the smoothest man in LA.
Maybe so, but Barbara, court records tell us that Johnnie assaulted you.
on-
Who the hell is behind this?
It's the DA's office.
[stammering] It's Shapiro.
Fuck!
There.
That's what's left of Nicole.
Thank you, Denise.
Are you helping my daddy find the man who hurt my mommy?
Ah...
Yeah, yes, that's right.
Your daddy's busy working on other things today.
Come on. Let's let them get to work, okay?
[door closes]
Go on. Open it.
"VISA card number two. 1989 to 1990."
Okay-.
I give U P-
- Nicole bought the gloves. - Our gloves.
Aris lsotoner model number 70263.
In the United States, the only place
that sold them was Bloomingdale's in New York.
Of all the 70263's only 300 pairs were extra large.
Bloomingdale's sold 200 of those on December 18th, 1990.
Nicole walked into that store and bought two pairs of our gloves.
- Holy shit! - Right! There we go.
This is it. This is not a story.
This is cold, hard, proof.
The gloves...
The gloves are our conviction.
[door opens]
What are you doing here?
Waiting for Johnnie. I can't wait to see this.
Johnnie, talk to us about this double life of yours. Did you beat Barbara?
Do you beat Dale, Johnnie?
I'm not here to discuss old gossip. What I care about,
is this trial in which there are two dead people
and an innocent man being framed.
You all should be ashamed of yourselves.
Excuse me. Thank you.
He's made of goddamned Teflon.
I need a vacation. Like now.
What?
I'm driving out to Oakland this weekend.
My best friend, childhood friend,
it's his birthday.
It's not a big thing, just getting together at a bar for some drinks,
and stay the night.
But you want to, you know, come along?
The drive up, it always unwinds me and,
you know, we're not, you're probably busy.
Gordon has the kids this weekend.
You know what? Hell, yes.
Yes, count me in.
W“ i0 go now, okay'!?
Hold, hold, hold.
What do you have on your lapel?
It is a police solidarity pin.
What the hell do you have that on for? Take that off.
I am trying to mitigate some of the damage that you're doing.
Damage? Damage to what?
Your cozy relationship with Garcetti and the LAPD?
What is happening?
Bob's lapel, LAPD solidarity pin.
Well, I hope you get the brains to take it off in front of the cameras.
You are hardly in a position to tell me
what's acceptable or not on television.
Hmmm.
It was Shapiro who planted that story, I know it.
I'm gonna find out how he did it.
And when I do...
[chuckles]
There's going to be hell to pay.
But it was him.
Hmmm.
So it was Bob Shapiro who made you live a
double life while you were married with Barbara?
I shut the press right down today, baby.
You'll never hear another word about it.
I handled it.
And you knew all that about me when we got married.
Yeah, I knew it, Johnnie!
But my friends didn't, my family didn't, my pastor didn't, Johnnie!
I'll find out what happened. I'll find out who did this.
Nobody did this.
There is no conspiracy, Johnnie. You cannot fix it.
Unless you have a time machine, I don't know anything about.
All your stuff with Barbara, all of it is in court records, Johnnie.
You made the world your stage.
You wanted the attention... Now you got it.
Now you got it.
[melancholic music]
Good morning.
Bob. Thanks for coming.
- Of course. - Close the door.
[clears throat]
[door closes]
[B0b] What's up?
This discovery from the DA about the glove.
They have receipts of Nicole purchasing them.
- Did you read this? - Yeah, yeah but...
They're not necessarily the gloves.
Bobby, please, you have to help me to talk again to everyone about a plea.
If we go in there with this glove thing, they will absolutely kill us.
And once it's done, we will have no chance to cut a deal.
Just talk to Johnnie, all right. I think making a deal is crazy.
Bobby there...
The reason I'm talking to you is that you may have a personal stake in this.
- Why? - The bag.
What bag?
0.J.'s bag that you maybe disposed of with the murder weapon.
That I what?
There's a video of you walking out of Rockingham with it.
Wait, wait, wait that...
That's 0.J.'s garment bag that he gave to me
to take to my house before he came to stay with me.
For the sake of both of us, please.
Don't continue to tell me any more.
Now wait a minute-
Look, if you do have the possession of the weapon
and you decided to turn it in,
I don't know.
I guess at most it would be accessory after the fact. You'd get
five years, out in two.
But I don't know if we could convince them
that you didn't know it was in the bag.
I think that... I don't know, maybe.
Bob what the... What are you doing?
Please, please.
No more talking, this is just starting to be a conflict of interest.
Gentlemen!
Are we ready?
Something's...
Somethings come up and I've got to go.
I'll catch up with you later.
- What's with him? - Possible developments.
Anything you care to share, Bob?
No, no, not at this time.
Shall we?
So that's it?
Nobody ever asked about it?
No, it's just sat here the whole time.
I didn't want to open it alone, you're the...
You're the only one who goes back all the way with us so I thought-
You did the right thing, Bobby.
You want me to open it?
[suspenseful music]
I knew it, I knew it, I knew there was nothing funky in that bag, Bobby.
He didn't do it.
You see that right? There's even more proof he didn't do it.
Who do you think did do it?
You know, my kids...
At school, the other kids, they tease Bobby.
Tell him his dad's...
Hey.
It's a tough time right now.
I know it's hard to be strong, but you got to stick in there.
You don't understand, I'm really struggling.
I'm really struggling here, A.C.
Even when it seems everybody else has stopped working
to figure out who did it,
I, I keep going over everything,
again and again.
Everything I know about Nicole,
everything I can learn about Ron Goldman.
I mean there has never been more information, more media coverage,
more detectives, more... Even the kooks.
All about one thing.
One crime ever. Ever!
And there's...
Just...
Nothing.
No other suspect?
No other answer?
There's nothing else.
Nothing else?
Nothing else but what?
I didn't mean it like that.
Good.
[door buzzing]
O.J.?
Is everything all right?
[door closes]
So late?
Where is everyone?
I see. Quality time then.
Where's your "I Love Cops" pin?
That was just a political positioning, if you will.
What are you up to, Bob? Why you be half stepping?
I don't know what that means.
Why do you keep trying to undermine Johnnie?
Crossing the quarterback all the time now, I see it.
Everybody sees it. It's palpable.
So I'll ask you again, Bob? What the hell are you up to?
Well, Johnnie and I have our differences
and we're clearing them up.
But I'm glad... I'm very glad that we're discussing this, because, 0.J.,
I think that this whole wild LAPD conspiracy theory
is going to backfire on us.
Bob! You were the one that came up with this idea.
No, no, no. I didn't. I came up with a bad apple idea.
- But Johnnie- - No! No, it was your play.
You were the first one to use the word conspiracy.
You were the one that said no one but Johnnie could make this work.
You think this whole damn thing up, man.
So I don't wanna hear no bullshit in the third quarter. You hear me?
Okay, you can say what you want. You can yell all night.
But everything I do out there is for your best interest.
It's what I do.
It's my agenda for you, and if you recall correctly,
it's why you came to me first.
Guard!
[door buzzing]
You better think hard and fast
about whether or not you want to be on this team,
'cause if you keep this bullshit up, there won't be no room here for you.
I know you heard that.
[door closes]
? Don't stop now, baby Let's twist some more r
[man 1] Yo, Chris.
[man 2] Yo, man.
What up, Byron?
- Happy birthday. - You made it, boy.
Oh guys, this is Marcia. Marcia, this is guys.
Byron the birthday boy.
Darrell, Moses, Philly, Rick.
Oh, what's this?
Oh, no, no. I ain't never gonna wear this.
Why not? It's a hundred percent cotton
and it might help you out of a traffic ticket.
[all laughing]
She got jokes?
Huh?
So is this an AA meeting or is someone gonna buy me a drink?
- Allow me, allow me. - Handle that boy.
[upbeat music playing]
Hit it, hit it. Come on, come on.
All right. To my main man, Byron. Happy birthday.
[all cheering]
Happy birthday.
- Now, I'm not saying that he did it. - Darrell.
Darrell, we had a rule. First one who mentions that goddamn case drinks.
Fine by me.
Mmmm.
I'm not saying that he did it.
- The jury's still out. - Yeah, that's right.
But I heard he was making some TV show about Navy Seals or some shit,
where he was trained to kill.
- Yeah, yeah, Frogmen. - Yeah, that's it.
They showed him all these kinds of techniques,
how to sneak around and kill people with knives,
cut throats and slash their legs, all of that.
Why ain't you talking about that in court?
Because the jury would be able to separate from TV and real life.
We're strong enough without that kind of crap.
The cops framed his ass anyway.
Is that right, Byron?
No, you're on your own now, brother.
No, no, no, no. Come on, come on, come on.
What's your theory?
Well, I think that cracker cop planted that glove.
And they all did what they had to do to prove that 0.J did it.
That's what I think.
Okay-.
Here's the crime scene Bundy. Here's O.J.'s house.
Okay-.
Fuhrman made up his mind at Bundy that Simpson did it.
Even though he had no idea if 0.J. had an ironclad alibi that would then ruin
Fuhrman's career and land him in jail.
Fuhrman takes the glove at Bundy,
makes sure it has Goldman and Nicole's DNA on it,
jumps in the car with the other detectives,
heads to Rockingham with it,
where he gets into the Bronco,
somehow getting all that evidence in it,
including Simpson's blood.
Even though the police didn't have Simpson's blood until the next day.
Hmmm umm.
Then he goes over the wall, plants the glove behind Kate's room.
Then, with the help of the rest of his
super secret cabal of O.J. hating, racist cops,
he starts getting everything just so
just where it needs to be.
Nicole and Ron and 0.J.'s blood into 0.J.'s bedroom.
0.J.'s blood back to Bundy.
Oh, and O.J.'s Bronco's fibers back to Bundy too.
And they don't forget to get rid of
the real killer's blood from the back gate.
No, no, no and replace it with 0.J.'s blood.
Then O.J.'s sock, they get that back to Bundy to pick up all the blood
and then get that sucker right back to Rockingham too.
These guys are a well-oiled conspiracy machine after all.
All this during a time when everyone involved is under the most relentless
media scrutiny in American history.
And all this for an unknown killer.
- Maybe. - No.
No.
Man, you're good. You real good.
When this is all over, you should go work for Johnnie. Both of you.
Yeah, yeah. Ha, ha. Very funny.
[making gunshot sound]
This round is on me.
- Yo. - Huh.
- She is a trip. -[Chris] Got schooled, both of you.
Tonight's the night, pal.
Out of town, her kids are at home. You all been drinking a little bit.
She's my co-worker. That's all.
Ummm hmmm.
Well look, have you ever thought about making that happen?
Tonight's the night.
- Sure. - Just saying.
[blues music playing]
No no.
Oh my God.
[both laughing]
Well, I'm coming back here next weekend with or without you.
Well, my friends might prefer it that way.
Ummm hmmm.
This is me.
This 311.
- Yeah, 311. - Yeah.
Aah, well.
Good night.
Good night, Darden.
[melancholic music]
Hey, big time. Got you a coffee.
Had one already.
Oh no, just leave that open, thanks.
Listen, I've been thinking.
Ummm hmmm.
I think you and I should just go for it.
And what does that mean?
Let's make 0.J. put on those gloves.
And we need a big one. Big moment, right?
We talked about this before.
And I decided that it's not a good idea.
At all.
And not the right time if it were.
But today is the glove testimony.
It's the only time.
Come on, we got to get down there.
The idea of O.J. just standing there
in front of those cameras and the jury,
-wearing those gloves. - Chris, come on.
We're going downstairs to get our conviction today.
We have his gloves, with all the DNA,
everybody's blood, the fibers, all of it.
We have a receipt that proves he owned them. We're done.
We've been dealt a king and a ten,
I don't know why you want to ask the dealer for another card.
- Because I know it's an ace. - No, you don't.
You turn over control of a demonstration
to the opponent, you don't know what's going to happen.
And certainly not to the defendant himself.
Okay? Now come on, let's go.
Do you think there is any way that these two gloves could not be a pair?
I'd have to say it would be virtually impossible.
All right, at this time we will take a 15 minute recess.
[gavel banging]
[sighs]
- Hello, Mark. - Bob.
[suspenseful music]
Hey.
Are any of you interested in something other than a conspiracy theory?
Some real demonstrable evidence.
Little bit of real lawyering.
Those gloves are too small.
Yes, Bob.
I tried the glove on in there myself, it didn't fit. It will never fit him.
I think we should have him try it on in court.
I think its a terrible idea. What if it doesn't work.
You don't make a play in there, if you don't know the outcome.
- I know the outcome. - My hand is bigger than Bob's!
Put me in, Coach.
So, saying we wanted to.
- How do we present it? - We don't.
We get them to present it.
Hmm.
[door opens]
[door opens]
Marcia.
They're glazing over. Now we got to get up and take it back.
Chris.
No way. Enough. Okay?
- I'm sorry. - Marcia-
Let me be clear.
This is my case.
You work for me here.
When I say drop it, you drop it.
- Are we clear? - Are you seriously saying that to me?
You're making me say it.
[door opens]
You, sir, have the balls of a stud field mouse.
What did you just say to me?
If you don't ask him to try on the gloves, I will.
[clerk] All rise!
[clears throat]
All right, you may be seated.
And these gloves, the ones you've brought today...
Now these would fit the wearer just as
the ones in evidence would. Is that correct?
Your Honor, sidebar.
Counsel approach the bench.
[clears throat]
Your Honor,
I see where this is going and I'm not having it.
And where is that, Counsel?
There will be no demonstrations involving my client.
If Mr. Simpson chooses to testify,
and we want to have him try on the actual glove
in evidence, that's one thing.
Further, I submit the timing is inappropriate your honor.
- Is that right, Johnnie? - That's right.
For who?
Opposing counsel hasn't asked for anything of the kind, Mr. Cochran.
They just tried to bring these ringer gloves in here
and they seem to be overly concerned about what I might or
might not want to do before I've even done it.
He can ask for whatever he wants to ask for, Mr. Cochran.
You can object if you want to object. Now let's proceed.
Your Honor, at this time the people would ask
that Mr. Simpson step forward
and try on the gloves recovered from Bundy and Rockingham.
We have no objection, Your Honor.
[suspenseful music]
Mr. Simpson, please approach the jury.
These gloves are too small.
[music intensifies]
Too tight, it won't fit.
Can Mr. Simpson please straighten his finger?
Can we ask that he make a fist?
With his right hand.
Can we ask that he...
Grasp an object with his hand,
a marker perhaps?
Objection, Your Honor.
Sustained.
Have we seen enough, Your Honor?
Mr. Darden.
Thank you.
No, Your Honor, I have nothing.
I have nothing further.
He was making them not fit.
I mean, you saw what he was doing.
And he had the gloves under...
He kept his fingers stiff.
He was acting, he was just...
[music intensifies]
[recording] Hello, you've reached the Goldman residence.
Please leave your message and we will return your call.
Fred, it's Chris Darden, I'm...
Sorry about what happened today.
I am sorry.
But it's not over yet. We'll come back from this.
We will.
Okay, call me any time.
Bye.
[theme music playing]
Sferastudios