Mark Fuhrman, L.A. police detective in O.J. Simpson murder case, dead at 74

Former Los Angeles police detective Mark Fuhrman, who was convicted of lying during testimony at the O.J. Simpson murder trial, has died. He was 74.

Fuhrman was one of the first two police detectives sent to investigate the 1994 killings of Simpson’s ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend, Ronald Goldman, in Los Angeles. He reported finding a bloody glove at Simpson’s home but his credibility came under withering attack during the trial as the defence raised the prospect of racial bias.

Under cross-examination, Fuhrman testified that he had never made anti-Black racial slurs over the previous 10 years, but a recording made by an aspiring screenwriter showed he had done so repeatedly.

Lynn Acebedo, the chief deputy coroner in Kootenai County, Idaho, said that Fuhrman died May 12. The county does not release the cause of death as a rule.

Fuhrman retired from the Los Angeles Police Department after Simpson’s 1995 acquittal. He subsequently moved to Idaho with his wife Caroline and their young daughter and son  and set up a 20-acre farm, raising chickens, goats, sheep and llamas.

In 1996, Fuhrman was charged with perjury and pleaded no contest. He later became a TV and radio commentator and wrote the book Murder in Brentwood about the killings.

A criminal-court jury found Simpson not guilty of murder in 1995, but a separate civil trial jury found him liable in 1997 for the deaths and ordered him to pay $33.5 million US to relatives of Brown and Goldman. He served nine years in prison on unrelated charges and died in Las Vegas of prostate cancer in 2024 at the age of 76.

Alan Dershowitz, a prominent lawyer and law professor who was a legal strategist on Simpson’s defence team said Fuhrman was a “much better detective than he was a witness.”

“He’s very smart, and you know, a very, very aggressive detective. Ultimately his actions helped us win the O.J. case because of his use of the N-word,” Dershowitz said Monday evening. “I got to know him later, after it was all over, and we had a cordial relationship.”

Authored book on famous cold case

Fuhrman’s father left when he was seven years old, and Fuhrman often cared for his younger brother while his mother worked. As an adult, he joined the marines and then the Los Angeles Police Department.

After retiring, Fuhrman spent several years as a Fox News contributor on crime coverage, while writing books.

Fuhrman’s 1998 book Murder in Greenwich: Who Killed Martha Moxley? shone a light on the mid-1970s homicide of a 15-year-old girl in Connecticut who had spent time with brothers Michael and Thomas Skakel — whose aunt Ethel was married to Robert F. Kennedy Sr. — the night of her killing. Fuhrman’s book pointed to Michael Skakel as the likely perpetrator.

“He really has stirred things up, and if he can focus attention on the case, we’re grateful to him,” said Dorthy Moxley, the victim’s mother.

A month after Fuhrman’s book was released, a grand jury was empanelled to consider charges in the Moxley homicide, though investigators insisted that the process was independent of the books written by Fuhrman, and earlier, Dominick Dunne.

Michael Skakel was found guilty of Moxley’s murder in 2002 and he spent over 11 years in prison before his conviction was vacated by Connecticut Supreme Court, with Skakel successfully arguing his original defence attorney provided ineffective counsel.