People of the State of Calif v. Phillip Spector

by Susan Leibowitz, Dateline producer

It was crowded on the 9th floor of the downtown criminal courts building on a hot Wednesday morning in Los Angeles.  The crowd was media from around the country and around the world gathering to cover a trial of a little man  famous for big sound. Phillip Spector, the musical genius behind the Crystals, the Ronettes, Darlene Love…. the man who turned the the Beatles' Let It Be into a symphony and changed rock and roll with his orchestrations and manipulations was on trial for the murder of a sometime actress Lana Clarkson.

It's been four years and nearly  three months since Clarkson was killed by a single bullet lodged in the back of her neck. She died nearly instantly, the prosecutor said in his opening statement, killed says the prosecutor by Phil Spector … accidental suicide say Spector's attorneys.  Now it's up to each side to prove their theory of Lana Clarkson's death. The trial is expected to take three-four months.

This trial is the first gavel to gavel broadcast live from that downtown courthouse in Los Angeles since OJ Simpson's criminal trial back in 1995. Back during OJ, a media room was set up on the 12th floor of the courthouse.  A few weeks ago, that media room was re-opened. A KNBC technician says when they came in, "it was like the OJ trial had just ended." The room was strewn with 1995 calendars and notes on the OJ trial and no doubt dust. It was a time capsule of another big trial. The time capsule is gone now, the 12th floor media room cleaned up and back in use to cover the murder of another beautiful blonde from Southern California.  Our NBC affiliate in LA is streaming the trial live on its Web site.