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The jury serving in O.J. Simpson's trial took a quick trip on Friday to the Las Vegas hotel room where the former NFL star is accused of bringing several men along to confront two sports memorabilia dealers and steal nearly $100,000 worth of items.
According to various reports, the nine-man, six-woman panel (and six alternates) took turns examining Room 1203 of the Palace Station Hotel and Casino in pairs, each of which spent no more than 30 seconds apiece glancing from bed to bathroom to chair and so on.
The jurors were accompanied by Simpson's attorneys and codefendant Clarence Stewart. Both Simpson and Stewart are charged with 12 counts of armed robbery, burglary, kidnapping, conspiracy and coercion, and could face life in prison if convicted of kidnapping.
According to the Los Angeles Times, Juror No. 12 measured the distance between the bathroom and a chair against the wall, and Alternate No. 5 touched the top of the bureau where the man who arranged the meeting, memorabilia collector Tom Riccio, secretly perched a digital tape recorder.
The jury also heard on Friday the complete recording that Riccio professes to have made of the confrontation, which the defense has already contended may have been doctored before he turned it over to authorities.
Riccio testified that one of the men with Simpson (later identified as accused accomplice Mike McClinton) "pulled out a gun...and it got crazy from there." The confrontation lasted about six minutes, Riccio said, and throughout Simpson was yelling at the alleged victims Alfred Beardsley and Bruce Fromong, both of whom have already given similar accounts of what went down in the room.
"Don't let nobody out of this room," Simpson can be heard saying at one point on the tape.
"I don't have a problem with you, man. Are you mad at me?" Beardsley is heard asking. Beardsley called 911 afterward, reporting that he had been robbed at gunpoint by Simpson and a group of "thugs."
