Free Outrage by Vincent Bugliosi

consistent with having been made by a swiping or brushing motion against the jeans by a sleeve from Goldman’s long-sleeved shirt, which was thick and roughly textured. Bodziak testified that he found a “striking similarity between the ribbed design on the shirt [taken from test impressions]” and the bloody imprint on the shirt. ( FBI special agent Douglas Deedrick, an expert on fiber evidence, had previously testified that the bloody imprint on the jeans appeared to have come from fiber such as that on Goldman’s shirt.) As to the small (“half the size of one’s thumb”) bloody imprint on the envelope, it too was not a part of a shoe print, again having no borders, being too erratic, and the patterns being so fine and small as to be uncharacteristic of any shoe sole or heel Bodziak had ever seen. Bodziak testified that the parallel lines were consistent with a “fabric” pattern, and could have come from the jeans or shirt of Goldman. Bodziak also testified that the bloody imprint on the piece of paper wasn’t a shoe print, and even if it had been, it would have had to come from the shoe of a tiny child.
    Lee demonstrated further incompetence in the forensic technique he employed to reach his conclusions. He made no test impressions of Ron Goldman’s Levi jeans and shirt (although photographs were taken of the small piece of paper, the LAPD criminalists did not collect it). This was shocking to Bodziak. He testified: “You could look at the fabric on my sleeves with a magnifying glass, but because of its three-dimensional quality, you could not determine what the exact pattern would look like in a test impression. It is absolutely essential to make test impressions for comparison purposes. It is the
only
way that you can make a valid comparison.”
    Lee, stung and wounded by the obvious repudiation of his conclusions by the FBI’s shoe print expert (Lee’s specialty is not shoe prints), told reporters from his laboratory in Connecticut that although he stuck to his conclusions, “I’m sorry I ever got involved in the Simpson case,” and said he would probably resist any defense subpoena to return to Los Angeles to defend himself and his conclusions.
    As it turned out, he didn’t have to defend or rehabilitate himself. His reputation was enough for the jury, which should have been skeptical of every single one of his conclusions once his shoe print and imprint testimony was proved to be claptrap. The foreperson of the jury, Armanda Cooley, said in the book she coauthored on the case,
Madam Foreman
: “Dr. Henry Lee was a very impressive gentleman. Highly intelligent,
world-renowned
. I had a lot of respect for Dr. Lee.” Lee’s discredited testimony hadn’t lessened his stature in Cooley’s mind one iota. Juror Lionel (Lon) Cryer told the
Los Angeles Times
right after the verdict that the jury viewed Lee as “the most credible witness” of all at the trial. Cryer repeated Lee’s statement that “there was something wrong,” saying the jury took these words back to the jury room with them. “Dr. Lee had a lot of impact on a lot of people,” he added.
    Lee’s reputation didn’t just have an impact on the members of the jury. Remarkably, after Lee testified for the defense on direct examination, Judge Ito looked down at Hank Goldberg, the deputy district attorney scheduled to cross-examine Lee, and said: “Frankly, if I were in your shoes I would cross-examine Dr. Lee for no more than half an hour. Accentuate the positive in a friendly and professional manner,
given his reputation, and then get out
.” Can you imagine that? Even David Margolick, the
New York Times
reporter who covered the trial in an expert fashion, and who should have known better, told his readers (before Bodziak testified) that Lee was “largely unassailable.”
    Ito and Margolick, at least for the moment, apparently forgot that all things and all people in life have to sink or swim on their own merits, not their