Simpson team is ordered to wrap up case on Monday

  Jonathan T. Lovitt

  01/09/1997

  USA Today

  FINAL

  Page 04A

  (Copyright 1997)

  SANTA MONICA, Calif. -- Judge Hiroshi Fujisaki delivered a pair of setbacks

  Wednesday to O.J. Simpson. He told Simpson's lawyers to wrap up their defense

  Monday and blocked an attempt to link Simpson's ex-wife to drugs.

  But Simpson's defense in his civil trial did appear to achieve one goal. It caught

  jurors' attention by suggesting that a leather glove in evidence was not the one

  collected by police at the scene where Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald

  Goldman were slain in June 1994.

  The day began with Fujisaki barring the defense from asking former Simpson

  house guest Brian ``Kato'' Kaelin about possible drug use by Nicole Simpson.

  Simpson says his ex-wife could have been killed by someone connected to drugs.

  But lawyers for the victims' families argued that Simpson had no evidence to

  support the claim.

  Fujisaki agreed.

  At the close of the day, Fujisaki swept aside a defense move to take the case

  beyond Monday, the day defense attorneys originally had planned to wrap up.

  ``You said you were going to finish Monday, and I'm going to hold you to it,'' he

  told them.

  ``That was just a guesstimate,'' Simpson's lawyer Daniel Leonard replied. But

  Fujisaki wouldn't relent.

  Earlier, Simpson lawyer Robert Baker questioned criminalist Dennis Fung about

  the left-hand glove found at the murder scene. Fung said he remembered a hole

  over the knuckle of the glove's fourth finger. But the glove in court Wednesday

  showed no such damage.

  ``I'm not sure this is the same glove,'' Fung testified.

  Jurors looked perplexed when the right and left gloves were passed around.

  Some held them up to see whether they matched.

  ``You would agree, Mr. Fung, that the glove that was booked into evidence and

  the glove in this picture are not the same?'' Baker asked. An objection by the

  plaintiffs blocked Fung from answering.

  Up next: Defense forensic expert Henry Lee testifies today via videotape.

  Simpson is scheduled to take the stand again Friday.

  PHOTO, B/W, Susan Sterner, AP