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From: Jasper
Date: 4/10/02
Time: 10:03:05 PM
Charlie,
The purpose of the interview wasn't for Vannatter and Lange to learn anything from O.J. to help with their investigation. The purpose was:
1) Getting O.J. to say something incriminating about his involvement in the murders -- his motive (jealousy, rage), means (weapon, attire, mode of travel, mode of attack) and opportunity (false alibi). 2) Catching him in a lie. (Jean sure corralled that one!)
Both of them approached O.J. as though they were his buddies, concerned about his welfare because of a few Columbo-like "little problems" that people who weren't his buddies might not understand. Vannatter's folksy old hack persona (thanks for that one, Charlie) was a hell of an effective weapon in that campaign.
A close reading of Lange and Vannatter's annotated interview in Evidence Dismissed will tell you that they were working from a full plate of inside information about O.J.'s possible motive, means and opportunity in the double homicide. They were looking for contradictions, sudden spikes of fear and bad answers to "innocent" good questions. Vannatter's comment about O.J.'s Bronco being parked at a "funny angle" was an obvious attempt that failed. Moreover, we can trace the source of the question to Mark Fuhrman because we know that there was NOTHING odd about the way the Bronco was parked.
A good description of O.J. at Sydney's recital (possible source: Kato and the Browns) tells you why Lange and Vannatter asked O.J. the particular questions they did about his clothes. They were assuming that he wore them when he committed the murders. The already had good reason to believe that he wore the same shoes. It made no sense that he would simmer in a growing rage and then change the rest of his clothes to commit a bloody murder. Whether they fund the or not his lie would betray him.
That line of questioning would work only if they thought they had credible witnesses who would swear to what he wore at the recital - the jacket, the pants and the rubber-soled shoes. They didn't know at the time that Cora Fischman had talked her husband Ron into taking a full-length photo of Sydney and O.J.
There were NO wasted questions. Each one was directed to their best guess about the killings based upon the information they had at their disposal at the time. They didn't have Ron Fischman's photo. They didn't have Bodziak's Bruno Magli Lorenzos. But I'll bet you a mountain of diamond earrings and bracelets that they had some great witnesses with some of the best verbal descriptions they had ever heard.
"Dumb and Dumber" knew what they were doing. If O.J. had been guilty they would have nailed him good. -- Jasper