Victim-Blaming Still at Large
by Katie Buckland As a former domestic violence prosecutor, I am gratified and relieved by the jury's decision in the Phil Spector murder case in the Superior Court of Los Angeles County. Spector, 69, a former music producer, was convicted Monday after his second trial of second-degree murder in the shooting death of Lana Clarkson almost six years ago. The jury system is at best an imprecise arbiter of justice. It is undoubtedly true, as one juror in the first trial in 2007, remarked, that Spector bought himself some forensic evidence by introducing bogus scientific evidence about the pattern of the blood splatter and position of the gun that tricked two jurors into thinking Clarkson had killed herself. According to comments after the first trial, one of the jurors found it relevant that the county coroner's office did not produce a "psychological autopsy" of Lana Clarkson. What exactly is a "psychological autopsy"? And are Americans really so addicted to cr...