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Schiller tells Simpson tale from the inside
October 14, 1996Web posted at: 11:00 p.m. EDT
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From Correspondent Art Harris
LOS ANGELES (CNN) -- The author who helped O.J. Simpson produce a book that earned $1.4 million to fund a dream-team defense has pulled a literary about-face with his latest release.
Writer Lawrence Schiller delivers an almost tell-everything book in "American Tragedy: The Uncensored Story of the Simpson Defense."
The book presents the so-called Dream Team -- warts, nightmares and all. From doubts about Simpson's innocence to a bitter rivalry that put Johnnie Cochran in charge, sidelining Robert Shapiro -- who Simpson kept on the team, the book says, to hide the defense disarray from the jury.
"This is the story of what happened on the inside. It's told by the people that had the experience, that lived it and had the traumas," Schiller said.
With the help of the defense lawyers, Schiller went behind bars to snag the first interview with Simpson after the murders and turned it into the lucrative tell-nothing book "I Want to Tell You."
The book was Schiller's brainchild, a way to help Simpson answer fan mail and earn cash to help pay a grateful defense team.
The author also had help from the inside with his new book.
Simpson confidante Robert Kardashian, a key source, pocketed an undisclosed sum for his insights and revelations of doubts about Simpson's innocence.
"I think Robert was important because he told me where the train had traveled," Schiller said. It was a train that put Schiller on the fast track to other Simpson sources.
Schiller, it seems, has a knack for gaining access to the famous and infamous.
As a photographer in the '60s, he photographed a nude Marilyn Monroe. He got the first interview with Jack Ruby, the man who shot JFK's killer. And he chronicled killer Gary Gilmore, who was executed by firing squad in 1977 in Utah.
Schiller was also prepared with a camera after Simpson's acquittal, taking pictures of the victory party at O.J.'s home for Star Magazine.
Sources tell CNN that Schiller's latest book has some of the former dream team defense lawyers uneasy. Nor is Simpson said to be happy that the book will be in stores this week -- its secrets possibly available to potential jurors in his civil trial.
Related stories:
- 'Remember me as The Juice,' Simpson begged in taped message - October 12, 1996
- Judge to let Simpson argue that bloody glove was planted - October 11, 1996
- O.J.'s friend says he doubts Simpson's innocence - October 10, 1996
- Slow process of Simpson jury selection continues - October 8, 1996
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