The People V. . . . The Dogs

It seems everyone in Brentwood had dogs.  Many of them were out with their dogs quite late at night, often at a regular time because of their owners having watched a favorite TV show or the news before going out to walk their dogs.  The owners therefore had a pretty good idea of what time it was if they heard or saw something that might have been related to the crime at the Bundy condo.

The prosecution, according to Episode Five, began its timeline for the murders at 10:15 pm when a wailing dog was heard coming from the direction of Nicole's condo.

It is presumed by the prosecution that the wailing dog was Kato, Nicole's Akita.  Not all the folks out that night heard the wailing dog when the prosecution's witness said it happened.  Others say a barking dog was heard from Bundy from 10:45 on.  Kato (the dog) was found barking outside the Bundy address at 10:55 pm by a couple passing by.  Finding no ID on the dog, they took it home only to discover the dog had quite a bit of blood on it.  So a friend was called who was willing to take the dog back to where it had been found.  That friend followed the dog up to where he could see Nicole's body.  He then called the police about 11:55 and they arrived at 12:17 am.

OJ also had an Akita. Her name was Chachi.  Akitas are good watchdogs, pretty possessive of their territory, pretty noisy when a stranger encroaches on it.  According to Freed and Briggs, Chachi was in the driveway at Rockingham when Detective Fuhrman climbed over the gate around 5:15 am to get into the mansion with Detectives Van Natter and Lange to tell OJ about Nicole's death.  Chachi made no fuss whatsoever when Fuhrman came in.  One of the things said about Fuhrman was that he was the "detective to the stars" and it appears he was familiar enough to Chachi not to cause it to act like a watchdog.

One of the police officers who was a friend of Fuhrman got to the Bundy crime scene before Fuhrman arrived around 2 am.  Fuhrman found him with Nicole's Akita, Kato, holding him and petting him.  No one had cleaned the blood off of Kato so the officer had blood on his uniform from the dog.  That same officer was with Fuhrman later in the early morning over at Rockingham where Fuhrman had him climb into the Bronco to pop the hood for Fuhrman, leaving some smears of blood from the crime scene inside the Bronco.

One more thing: How did Kato get out of the condo?  Apparently it was sleeping upstairs with the children when Nicole and Ron were killed.  The prosecution contended that OJ was chased by the dog but they never explained how it got out.  They never were able to explain the fact that the distance between the blood stained Bruno Magli shoe prints was small enough that the prints indicated walking deliberately and not in haste.

Strangely, the bloody foot prints led out the front and also out the back with bloody paw prints going both ways as well.  Why did the foot prints go both ways?  Did Kato open the condo door himself?  Did he really chase the murderer?

If only dogs could talk.