Ford believes that the Simpson trial had a similar legacy for African Americans because they saw the same evidence presented as white Americans yet many still believed he was innocent.
#OJ SIMPSON NOT GUILTY FREE#
The event was a moment of clarity for white Americans as they were forced to confront the realities of racial injustice in America as the admitted murderers of Till, protected by double jeopardy, remained free for the rest of their lives. The outrage then mobilized into the civil rights movement of th 1960s after the defendants' brazen admission one year later. The murder of Till shocked the nation for its brutality, which then turned into outrage after the defendants were speedily acquitted by an all white jury, despite strong evidence of guilt. The outcome is often disappointing and that is what motivates positive change. These national trials are often seen as a test of the nations conscience. In The Race Card: How Bluffing About Bias Makes Race Relations Worse, African American Stanford Law Professor Richard Thompson Ford wrote that the two most important race trials of the 20th century were that of Emmett Till and O.J. A historic drop in diversity in the University of California and California State University education systems followed which later led to a similar lack of diversity seen in the state's White-collar job market, particularly the high tech area of Silicon Valley since most of the early pioneers of the Dot.com boom of the late 1990s were graduates from the UC and CSU systems.
The passage of California Proposition 209 in 1996 that ended affirmative action in the state is also attributed to the verdict as well because it resulted in declining empathy towards issues of racial discrimination and civil rights among White Americans. The trial is also credited with raising awareness about the stigma that Interracial couples still face from both white and African Americans. It is credited with transforming public opinion about domestic abuse from being considered a private familial matter to a serious crime. The trial and verdict had an historic impact on American culture. His arrest and conviction in 2008 for armed robbery brought him back into the public spot light, especially after he received a disproportionately higher prison sentence than his co-conspirators, which generated controversy even from his detractors, but the response from African Americans was relatively muted, and pundits opined this demonstrated how much the conscience of Black America has evolved since the time the verdict was announced. Simpson's celebrity status faded among Africans Americans after he relocated to Florida and disappeared from the public eye.
#OJ SIMPSON NOT GUILTY SERIES#
The television series CSI: Crime Scene Investigation popularized the reliability of DNA matching with the public as well.
Without either of them, defending Simpson's innocence became increasingly untenable as there was no justification for doubting the DNA evidence against him.
Most African Americans believed Simpson was innocent, but that changed one year later after the civil trial when Barry Scheck's contamination claim and all of his blood planting claims were disproven. The narrowing racial gap is primarily attributed to several factors: Daniel Petrocelli disproving all of the blood planting claims at the wrongful death civil trial, defense witness Henry Lee published a peer review study in 1996 that effectively refuted the contamination claim that disputed the validity of the states DNA evidence, and the fading of Simpson's celebrity status since the trial. Current polling shows the gap has narrowed since the trial, with the majority of black respondents in 2016 stating they believed Simpson was guilty. Polling showed that most African Americans believed Simpson was innocent and justice had been served, while most White Americans felt he was guilty and the verdict was a racially motivated jury nullification by a mostly African-American jury. Although the nation observed the same evidence presented at trial, a division along racial lines emerged in observers opinion of the verdict, which the media dubbed the "racial gap". Simpson murder case was announced and Simpson was acquitted on both counts of murder. On Tuesday, October 3, 1995, the verdict in the O.
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