From: Jasper
Date: 10/16/01
Time: 8:42:40 PM
Miss Marple,
I have no doubt at all that Fuhrman stuck it to the detectives and the prosecutors the same way he did to the vast majority of people who applauded his performance on the witness stand. He was a true artist, a good writer, a great actor and an even better director who knew how to frame each scene he appeared in for the most dramatic effect.
Yes, I do remember how devastated (and devastated is the right word) Vannatter and Lange were when Fuhrman took the Fifth. Let's face it, how many Americans can honestly say they are socked to hear anther American use the n-word in a private conversation between consenting adults? The shock was in how differently Fuhrman presented himself to Laura Hart McKinny than he presented himself to them. This guy was boasting about his ability to murder people and frame people and tell convincing lies in court. With rumors flying everywhere that he had boasted of being Nicole's secret, he was making inappropriate reference to oral sex, which just happened to be Nicole's preferred form of sex.
Meanwhile, there sat Lange, locked into a story about a "hastily parked" vehicle that really said, "turned sharp corner." There sat Vannatter unable to explain what he was doing with that vial of O.J.'s blood at Rockingham (a "helpful" suggestion, perhaps, from Fuhrman to move things along?). There sat both of them knowing full well that Fuhrman lied to them and Marcia Clark about a lot of "little things" that they incorporated into their stories. There sat Marcia Clark with a star witness who wrote at least some of the script that she, Vannatter and Lange acted out on Rockingham, a star who directed the manner in which she would treat witnesses and fellow prosecutors who claimed that he not what he appeared to be.
There they all sat knowing that they adlibbed "little lies" of their own on the courtroom set to protect Mark Fuhrman and themselves - lies that now loomed large. Fuhrman the writer. Fuhrman the star. Fuhrman the director. Fuhrman the spider spinning his web just like Iago did in Shakespeare's Othello.
This was a guy that Vannatter, Lange and Clark undoubtedly thought they were superior to, a guy that they thought THEY could manipulate because he was so obviously less knowledgeable and experienced than he pretended to be. In both of those areas, they had it all over him. Sure Fuhrman was a braggart who couldn't keep himself from lying just a tad now and then or telling an occasional whopper to make himself look good. That much anyone could see. What Vannatter, Lange and Clark couldn't see was how well he understood that flaw in his character and how well he had mastered turning some people's underestimation of him because if it to his advantage. -- Jasper