Money can buy 'reasonable doubt' in a murder case in America: that is the conclusion being drawn by legal experts and angry commentators in the wake of the mistrial in the Phil Spector case.
Ten of the 12 jurors and nearly everyone else who has followed the trial concluded that Spector, 67, the mad genius of rock 'n' roll who invented the Wall of Sound in the 1960s, fired the .38 calibre bullet that killed Lana Clarkson as they were alone together in his faux castle in the Los Angeles suburbs.
He remains the accused: prosecutors will apply for a retrial at a hearing on Friday week. But he continues to be free on $1m bail because two of the jurors came to believe that there was 'reasonable doubt' over whether Spector killed Clarkson.
"Whether you are buying a car, a
|  |
|
 |
 |
|
Experts are fuming at the injustice of Phil Spector’s mistrial, charles laurence reports from New York |
| |
boat or a defence, the bigger the budget the better the ride," said Robert Hirschorn, a Houston jury consultant specialising in high-profile cases.
American justice has been left reeling. The Spector mistrial follows a series of unlikely acquittals of the rich-and-famous in southern California, epicenter of celebrity culture: OJ Simpson and Robert Blake, on murder charges, and Michael Jackson on child molestation.
"Does anyone out there believe some penniless schmo with a dead woman in his house and a gun in his hand would beat the rap if his lawyer was a no-name and he couldn't afford a parade of favourable witnesses?" fumed Los Angeles Times columnist Steve Lopez.
There are thousands of men on death row in America, a disproportionate number of them black or Hispanic, who have been  |
Phil Spector guilty of murder of Lana Clarkson
Slow justice is bad news for us all
Phil Spector awaits jury verdict
