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O.J. Simpson in Court for Hearing on Motion for New Trial

O.J. Simpson is in court today, seeking a new trial in his Nevada robbery and kidnapping case. The grounds: ineffective assistance of counsel. His lawyer, Yale Galanter, denies the allegations.

Galanter is also being sued in federal court by his local co-counsel in the case, Gabriel Grasso. Grasso alleges he had an oral agreement with Galanter to be paid $250,000 in legal fees for his participation in the defense. Grasso says he expended over 1,000 hours and expended thousands in costs. He says Galanter received $500,000 for defending OJ and never paid him anything other than a partial cost reimbursement of $15,000. In pleadings obtained from PACER, Galanter argues there was no written fee agreement with Grasso and under Nevada ethical rules, it would be improper to share fees with another lawyer without the written permission of the client. [More....]

Galanter is suing Grasso (and Grasso's attorney and one of OJ Simpson's appeal attorneys) for defamation in Miami.

O.J. is not alleging Grasso was ineffective. Thus, only his attorney-client privilege with Galanter has been waived.

More here.

The hearing is being live-streamed by WPTV, in Las Vegas. It is expected to last 5 days. The judge has agreed to hear 19 of his claims. O.J. is expected to take the stand Wednesday.

Lousy media reporting award so far today goes to Time Magazine whose headline refers to O.J.'s grounds for a new trial as "excuses." The article then reports "Here are five reasons Simpson has offered since the time of his 2008 trial to explain why he’s not guilty." The claims do not pertain to his guilt or innocence, but to whether he received a fair trial due to ineffective assistance of counsel.

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    Actually, no (none / 0) (#1)
    by jbindc on Tue May 14, 2013 at 09:14:45 AM EST
    Lousy media reporting award so far today goes to Time Magazine whose headline refers to O.J.'s grounds for a new trial as "excuses." The article then reports "Here are five reasons Simpson has offered since the time of his 2008 trial to explain why he's not guilty." The claims do not pertain to his guilt or innocence, but to whether he received a fair trial due to ineffective assistance of counsel.

    Two of the five reasons are actually reasons given by Simpson as to why he thinks he's not guilty and make no mention of his attorneys, so they are not arguments for whether or not he received a fair trial and had effective assistance of counsel.

    From the Time link:

    1. Simpson believed he was taking back what was his.

    In the incident that led to a prison sentence, Simpson and five other men confronted two memorabilia dealers in a Las Vegas hotel in what he called a "sting operation," according to the Las Vegas Review-Journal. He recognized the men from previous interactions and accused them of stealing from him. He ordered that no one should leave the room, and, as the men with him were collecting the memorabilia, one pulled a gun, according to testimony. Nobody was harmed, but what happened fit kidnapping and robbery charges.

    SNIP

    5. Concussions made him do it.

    This actually never made it to trial the first time, and his new attorneys have abandoned it for his attempt at a new trial, but Simpson once claimed that concussions that he experienced during his long professional football career skewed his judgment to the point where he could not discern whether or not what he was doing was a criminal act. His lead attorney Patricia Palm told ESPN.com, "We did not pursue that path [the concussions] and will not present it during the hearing." But that's likely because there is little documented evidence that Simpson ever actually suffered a serious head injury, according to Slate.



    "an oral agreement??????" (none / 0) (#2)
    by Mr Natural on Wed May 15, 2013 at 08:12:47 AM EST
    - "Grasso alleges he had an oral agreement with Galanter to be paid $250,000 in legal fees for his participation in the defense."

    I'm wondering if I'd really want to be defended by an attorney naive enough to accept an oral agreement in that amount.  Isn't this Law School 101 or something like that?