A friend wrote to say he was looking forward to seeing what I had to say about the Phil Spector verdict. Well, how about that it's nice when the system seems to work like it's supposed to? Spector was not a man who should have been allowed to roam about free and probably hasn't been one for a long time. One audio engineer I know who had worked with him said, just after Lana Clarkson was murdered, "I'm very surprised."
All of us who heard him say that were surprised that he was surprised…until he added, "I'm surprised it took him this long to kill somebody."
I met Lana Clarkson a few times. She occasionally came to comic-type conventions and she'd briefly dated a friend of mine. She seemed like a lovely, lively individual. I didn't know her well but folks who did say that the notion she'd committed suicide was an outrageous fabrication on the part of Spector's lawyers.
It was slimy but probably to be expected. What else could they say? If Spector had been poorer, he probably would have had to settle for a quick plea bargain and — who knows? — he might have wound up with a lighter sentence. But he had the bucks to mount an all-out defense so he got one. His attorneys couldn't very well argue that someone else had slipped into the house and shot her. Not with that limo driver waiting outside. So by the process of elimination, they had to argue that Lana killed Lana…and they worked backwards from there, spinning madly and trashing the victim. I wonder if they ever considered trying to pin it on the limo driver.
Sentencing is set for late May. I can't imagine how the lawyers can argue that the maximum sentence is inappropriate but I'm sure they'll come up with something.