i believe oj because i want to believe oj.

like a lot of black kids in the early 70s, oj was my hero.

he had style, grace, flair, and soul.

and like lots of black people, when oj was declared not guilty, i breathed a heavy sigh of relief.

unlike a lot of people, i actually was able to watch most of the trial.

my particular job at the time, had me working the evening shift if i wanted to. and why wouldn’t i want to?

i watched the whole thing on E! who had commentary during the breaks, pre- and post-coverage, and a nearly gossipy approach to the proceedings that made it more of a live action soap opera than a legal tussle. they made it easy to follow. they had all the best guests. it started around 9 or 10 in the morning and was done around 3 or 3:30. it became part of my daily routine.

as someone wanting to believe that he was not guilty, i raised my eyebrows when the LAPD couldn’t account for nearly half of the blood that they collected from OJ to compare with the blood found in his bronco and at the scene and on the blood. i scratched my head when marcia chose to never include the slow chase (pictured) where oj hid in the back of the bronco and called his mother sobbing. allegedly.

and when the glove didn’t fit, i had to acquit.

E! gave me a new hero: johnny cochran.

Blacks were rooting for OJ because he represented a Black man on trial. not only that, but of a Black man killing a skinny young blonde white woman. none of us wanted to believe that any of that was true.

currently i am telling myself that it was drug dealers who killed nicole after she built up a healthy habit that oj might have financed in the past, but for whatever reason had stopped paying for. this would explain why oj went on the slow speed chase with a passport, cap, fake moustache and wallet (he thought the drug dealers were going to kill him too) crying to his mother.

i don’t think that oj, a guy who had never had a problem with women, infact the new E! True Hollywood Story about OJ (which gets rerun this afternoon) says that one reason that Nicole wanted a divorce was because of his infidelity. wasn’t oj was dating a playboy model? how many 49 year old guys dating playboy models stab their ex-wives over a lover’s quarrel? you have lover’s quarrels when you’re deeply in love. when you’re deeply in love you don’t bang other women. the prosecution cant have it both ways. not guilty.

i think that nicole didn’t pay her drug tab. i think that oj once paid these tabs but once they were divorced stopped paying. maybe he would pay now and then, but this time he said no. i think the drug dealers called oj on a last ditch effort to get the money and said theyd kill her if they didn’t get it. i think oj called their bluff, and lost. and when they were done, they went to the back of oj’s house, knocked on kato’s wall and dropped their bloody glove in his yard.

both ron and nicole was slashed across the neck. nicole, in such a way that she was nearly decapitated. those people were not stabbed in a way to be punished, they were stabbed in a way to be killed. emotional killings, i would think, would include shouts, tears, cries of grief. none of this happened. Ron was stabbed 9 times, i think, nicole 19. that’s pretty efficient for a first time double murderer, if you ask me.

anyway, in the new True Hollywood Story, we hear that OJs dad just might have been gay. we hear that OJ dated a 21 year old during his last stay in California and she moved to Florida with him, she, getting an apartment in Miami.

i also learned that OJ has an income of at least $23,000 a month, which cant be touched by the courts. and he has a personal 401k for his retirement.

not a bad two hour recap of the whole thing.

they also claim that he was a ticket scalper of 49er games when he was in junior high.

and a pie stealer.