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On Thursday, I went over to South Bundy Drive in Brentwood, the place the double homicide occurred. O.J. Simpson was lifeless at 76. And that well-known scene of violence was eerily quiet on a shimmering spring day in Los Angeles.
I had written almost 30 years in the past in regards to the barbaric slayings of Nicole Brown Simpson and her buddy Ron Goldman at Ms. Simpson’s apartment, and the notorious trial that drilled into probably the most delicate components of the nationwide psyche, exposing conflicting views about race and policing and superstar and authorized equality.
There have been farcical components of O.J. Simpson’s “trial of the century,” from the witness Kato Kaelin, the houseguest with the frosted shag who had starred within the comedy “Seaside Fever,” to Decide Lance Ito, who was such a narcissistic digicam hog that he grew to become often called Decide Itomaniac.
However I at all times considered it as an important American tragedy. It had echoes of “Othello,” probably the most trenchant work ever written on the deadly flaw of jealousy.
Othello was a hero, a Black man beloved for his exploits on the sector, a person who conquered racial setbacks and beguiled his followers and soared to nice heights.
He was married to an exquisite youthful lady. However, because of Iago — a deputy to the overall who was jealous himself as a result of he was handed over for a promotion in favor of one other aide-de-camp — Othello was poisoned with jealousy, unable to deal with the demons in his head.
Desdemona, his spouse, was confused, as a result of Othello was spun up over false info. Her servant, Emilia, defined that jealous folks “should not ever jealous for the trigger, However jealous for they’re jealous. It’s a monster, Begot upon itself, born on itself.”
Othello murdered Desdemona, whereas nonetheless loving her.
A 12 months after O.J.’s homicide trial, I stood in line behind the soccer legend’s lawyer, Johnnie “If the glove don’t match, you need to acquit” Cochran, at Invoice Clinton’s second inaugural. Cochran, who acted as if the Simpson case was a civil rights battle akin to Brown v. Board of Schooling, would quickly have his personal present on CourtTV.
A stream of women and men excitedly approached Cochran, eager to have their footage taken with the lawyer who acquired O.J. off.
Celeb trumps all. Or nearly all.
O.J. escaped in his legal trial however not in his civil trial, although he by no means paid the penalty or expressed any penance.
He didn’t, nevertheless, escape the opprobrium of many in America who felt that he acquired away with homicide.
In 1995, as an acquitted O.J. plotted to rehabilitate himself, I felt that the victims had gotten misplaced within the circus.
I drove an hour exterior of Los Angeles to the Ascension cemetery in Lake Forest. There have been bougainvillea, carnations, sunflowers and daisies heaped on the plain darkish marble marker at Nicole Brown Simpson’s grave. Individuals had left teddy bears and rosaries.
One little boy wrote a be aware promising he would by no means be imply to a lady when he grew up. A mom wrote a be aware assuring Nicole that her two youngsters can be OK: “Your kids’s guardian angels will deal with them.”
I talked to a lady named Teresa Myers from Portland who stood staring on the grave for a very long time. “Perhaps she’s higher off now as a result of she’s at peace,” Myers advised me. “However possibly she’s not as a result of she is aware of now that no one can contact him.”
Once I left South Bundy on Thursday, I mentioned somewhat prayer for the victims and their households. Fred Goldman, Ron’s father, mentioned upon listening to of O. J.’s dying, “No nice loss.”
I really feel the identical.
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