The O. J. Simpson murder case (officially called the People v. Simpson) was a criminal trial held in Los Angeles County, California Superior Court from January 29 to October 3, 1995, in which former American football star and actor O. J. Simpson was tried on two counts of murder following the June 1994 deaths of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman. The case has been described as the most publicized criminal trial in American history. Simpson was acquitted after a lengthy trial that lasted over nine months—the longest jury trial in California history.Simpson hired a high-profile defense team initially led by Robert Shapiro and subsequently led by F. Lee Bailey and Johnnie Cochran. Los Angeles County believed it had a solid prosecution case, but Cochran was able to persuade the jurors that there was reasonable doubt about the DNA evidence (then a relatively new type of evidence in trials) – including that the blood-sample evidence had allegedly been mishandled by lab scientists and technicians – and about the circumstances surrounding other exhibits.Cochran and the defense team also alleged other misconduct by the Los Angeles Police Department. Simpson's celebrity and the lengthy televised trial riveted national attention on the so-called "Trial of the Century". By the end of the criminal trial, national surveys showed dramatic differences between most blacks and most whites in terms of their assessment of Simpson's guilt
