Faith Hedgepeth murder verdict; Did OJ have an accomplice?

Hello and welcome to the sidebar presented by True Crime News taking you inside the courtrooms of high-profile notorious cases from across the country. I'm your host Joshua Ritter. I'm a criminal defense lawyer based in Los Angeles and previously an LA County prosecutor for over a decade. We are recording this on Wednesday, October 21st, 2026. In this week's episode, newly unsealed documents suggesting O.J. Simpson may have had an accomplice. Plus, Matthew Farwell's ongoing trial as the former officer faces allegations of killing his pregnant mistress. But first, the fate of a man accused of killing a UNC student will soon rest in the hands of a jury. Today, we are joined by R.J. Drayling, a former prosecutor, criminal defense attorney, and legal analyst you can catch on CNN, Fox News, Court TV, and many other outlets. R.J.'s also a good friend. Welcome back. How are you? >> Thank you so much for having me, Josh. It's great to be here. >> I'm glad that you're here because um a lot of these cases I think need a criminal defense attorney's touch, especially someone with your expertise having worked in the prosecutor's office as well, especially when we get into this newest O.J. Simpson uh news. But we're not going to start there. We're going to start out of Durham County, North Carolina, where the man accused of killing a UNC student broke down in tears this week, but it wasn't out of sympathy for the victim.

Miguel Salguero Oliveras displayed his strongest emotions thus far in his trial for Faith Hedgepeth's killing when viewing video from a jail phone call made with a friend. In the video, Oliveras' now deceased friend is having trouble hearing him when Oliveras displays a note instructing her to call him at a specific number. Authorities used the note to further link Oliveras to the scene of had slaying where a paper bag was left scrawled with the words "I'm not stupid" then the B word and jealous. While Oliveras shared shed a tear for his departed friend, prosecutors claim he showed no sympathy for Hedgepeth, bludgeoning the woman to death with a bottle and sexually assaulting her. Before wrapping up their case, prosecutors outlined copious DNA evidence allegedly linking Oliveras to the fatal assault, which occurred in the apartment building where Oliveras had been celebrating a barbecue. This week, soon after the prosecution rested their case, the defense also rested without presenting any witnesses. Though cross-examined through cross-examination, the defense has argued that the investigation was flawed and short-sighted. Though his attorney has prevented been prevented from uh presenting third-party culpability to defense, they have made Hedgepeth's roommate Karina Rosario a topic of interest, pointing to her alleged inaccuracies in interviews with law enforcement. It remains to be seen if these arguments will sway jurors, but we will keep updated on this case as it progresses.

RJ, this is one of the reasons why I'm happy to talk to you today with all of your experience because a a question I get quite often is how does third-party culpability work? Why is it that you're not allowed as the defense to just cast doubt at other people and cast suspicion on other people and say, "Hey, my client didn't do it and by the way, look at these other people who are maybe good for it." What What is How does that all break down? >> It's [snorts] a great question. So, the way the this particular rule works and the the term is you hit it, which is third-party culpability. And the way that works is before anyone in a case is allowed to kind of point the finger in a direction other than the accused, there has to be some evidence linking that person to the commission of the offense. You can't just throw your hands up and say, "Well, there's other maniacal people who live in the area. There's a a sex offender who lives next door. There's all these other people who could theoretically have a motive to commit this particular crime. You have to have something that connecting that person to the commission of the offense.

And it's really a way to streamline the process of trial to keep defense attorneys from confusing the jury, from kind of muddying the issues. It keeps things very focused. So, if there is some evidence linking a third person to a particular offense, and the defense can present that, generally speaking, it's going to come in. But, it's not enough just say someone else might have been responsible. The judge, generally speaking on cases like that, is going to kind of cut them off and say, you know, you can you're free to ask your questions on cross, you're free to talk about reasonable doubt, you're free to talk about other people that were there that night or in the area. But, as far as specifically pointing the finger at someone, you got to have some evidence before you can do that. >> Now, and thank you for that. That does make it much easier to understand. Now, what the defense has done in these cases, they've gotten about as close to that line as they could with this roommate, Karina Rosario, who lived with Hedgepeth at the time. She was the person who discovered her, and she was the person that was last known to have seen her. Um by kind of portraying this as look at her, maybe police should have done more to investigate her. Is that kind of a clever way for them to shoe string this third-party culpability in by saying this was a bit of a rush to judgment on the part of the prosecution, that they weren't really looking and beating down other leads the way they should have?

>> That's absolutely correct. And look, there's two answers to your question. The first answer to your question is absolutely, even though they might not be able to specifically get up in court and say the roommate did it or the other person did it or whoever did it. They can certainly ask questions on cross and raise the issue in the jurors' minds and say things, well, detective so-and-so, did you look at this the room Did you check the roommate's phone? Did you look at the roommate's emails? Did you ask the roommate about this particular piece of evidence found at the scene of the crime? And suggest through through questioning to the jury that that the the investigators made their conclusion too quick, that there are other things they should have looked at before kind of conclusively deciding that this particular person committed the murder. Now, the second answer to your question is the fact that the defense is kind of pointing the finger at the direction of the roommate, the last person who saw her alive and I believe does you said discovered the body in the morning, probably very well speaks to the fact that the defense is nervous about the state of the evidence. It's it's not going to be a very good argument to necessarily, or I should say it's going to be interesting to see how it plays out, but it's not going to be something I believe that's going to be particularly persuasive to the jury to set to insinuate that her friend and roommate who discovered the body was somehow responsible for this particularly brutal attack and particularly brutal murder.

>> Yeah. And I mean, the strongest evidence in this whole case and and the reason they filed it, the reason they solved it, or so they believe, the reason that we have a prosecution is because of that DNA that they found not only on the crime scene, not only connecting it to that note that was found on the discarded takeout bag, but also on her person and I'm going to try to be delicate about this in ways that suggest that she was also sexually assaulted. Okay. Now, you would think that is very convincing evidence that this man committed this crime, sexually assaulted her and then murdered her. However, the prosecution has struggled to find another connection between Oliveros and Hedgepeth. They've pointed towards oh, they're they used to work at restaurants that were across the street from each other. Well, >> [laughter] >> you could work your entire life at a restaurant and never meet anybody who worked in the the restaurant. Or that he lived about a a few miles away from where she lived. I mean, the best they can do is at least say, "Listen, this guy was in connected to the area, but they don't have like that gotcha moment of this is where they met."

Here's my question, and it's a long lead-up to that, but are they getting themselves into trouble that's maybe not being asked for by trying and struggling to make this connection when they already have his DNA and just leave it at that? We don't know how they met, but we do know they met cuz his DNA's all over the place. >> That's That's an excellent point. So, the issue you're touching on, which is generally speaking, jurors like to get a complete picture, not just of what happened, but why it happened. If you have a kind of why open, it leaves a lot of room for, "Well, then why would he just crawl to this woman's Like, there must been Maybe he had a psychiatric issue, or maybe there was someone else involved." It can kind of leave some holes for the defense to kind of wiggle their way through and and argue as reasonable doubt. So, another case we're going to talk about later, O.J. Simpson, you had both DNA and you had motive. In this case, you're you're you have all the DNA, but you're missing the motive. So, from a prosecutor standpoint, to your point, it can sometimes make things worse and you lose credibility when you're trying to argue, "Well, they met at a They worked at a restaurant together or a restaurant nearby. Therefore, that's the motive."

You make this huge jump to motive. >> Yeah. >> And it maybe strategically, to your point, it would be better just to, at the beginning of the case, tell the jury, you know, "There is going to be Not even beyond a reasonable doubt, there's going to be no doubt that this man brutally murdered this girl, but it is not my burden to prove to you why he did it. All you need to worry about for your job as a juror is whether he did it, rather than kind of struggling and stumbling along this issue with motive, which to your point can can can give the defense an opening. >> Yeah. I used to and I'm curious to see how you handled this, but I would always address this with jurors in voir dire when I was a prosecutor where I would say, "Listen, I fully intend to prove this case to you beyond a reasonable doubt, but I can also guarantee you I'm not going to be able to answer every question that comes up in your mind and every mystery that it might arise in the story that you're about to hear unfold because you're 12 smart people and put you all in a room together, you're going to come up with some questions, some mystery, and I just simply can't answer all of them, but that's not my job." How did you deal with that in jury selection?

>> Yeah, that's I my experience has been as a prosecutor, that's the best way to deal with that particular kind of gap in your story is to front load it with a jury and let them know, you know, address, you know, address the elephant in the room. We're not going to be able to prove to you why exactly he went into this woman's apartment, why exactly he broke in, what his mindset was in the minutes, hours, or days leading up to it, but what we will absolutely prove is he broke in there, he brutally murdered her, and he did X, Y, and Z. And my experience has been is that's the best way to do it rather than kind of clunkily trying to piece together the motive. I I remember I had a case as a prosecutor where a boyfriend broke into his pregnant girlfriend's apartment and strangled her twice to the point of unconsciousness. When she woke up a third time, he slit her throat. He stole her car and left. And it was a brutal case. He was convicted. But the gap was we tried to talk to the victim, we tried to talk to witnesses.

We didn't really know what the motive was. And at the end of the day, the jury I could tell. We could all tell. They want the complete picture. >> Yeah. >> They want the complete picture. We had We had the compelling evidence. We had pointed out to them in the beginning that there's this there's this um there's this lack of motive, and that it's not my burden to prove why someone did it. It's just my burden to prove that they did it beyond a reasonable doubt. So, it's it's a great point, Josh, which is And I think this is true on the defense side. You you you lose credibility when you reach on these issues and try to piece things and you know when you're doing it. Like this isn't I mean, this isn't a good idea. It's better just to address the weaknesses up front and focus on your strengths. >> Yeah. It's funny, too, because motive is usually one of the things jurors are most curious about. They want to know the why. We're going to search tell them the who, what, when, and where, and how, but they really want to know the why because that's part of the story, but when you think about it, to add that burden of having a prosecutor prove to you what was going through a person's head is just too much. Prove that they intended to do it, sure, but prove why, what their motivation for it is just something that's sometimes impossible to tell. All right, we're going to leave that one there for now. As we said, it will soon uh be in the hands of a deliberating jury, and we will keep you updated. In the meantime, let's move to Boston, Massachusetts, where the trial against a former cop charged with killing his pregnant mistress continues as prosecutors seek to prove that he not only killed the woman, but did so to prevent her from outing his other

criminal indiscretions. When Sandra Birchmore was discovered dead in her apartment after a wellness check, the medical examiner initially deemed the death self-inflicted. However, as news of her affair with Stoughton officer Matthew Farwell came to light, including allegations he groomed her from the age of 15, federal authorities stepped in to continue the botched investigation. Prosecutors claim that Birchmore turned the tables on Farwell, threatening to out their illicit relationship if he didn't give her a child and take a role in the child's life. That's when Farwell realized he could no longer control Birchmore, according to authorities, and strangled the woman before staging the scene. Farwell's defense has conceded he was having an affair with Birchmore, but maintains she took her own life. Birchmore's mental health has been a focus throughout the opening weeks of testimony with text messages and journal entries alluding to self-harm. However, this has been juxtaposed with testimony from people around Birchmore claiming that the expectant mother was excited about her future. Jurors will ultimately be tasked with deducing the means and motives in the young woman's death and will continue to keep an eye on this case as it unfolds in federal courts.

Uh getting back to our question about motive. Uh you know, many times prosecutors will explain to jurors they don't have to prove motive, and motive isn't an element, and other times that's the best thing they got is motive. Motive seems to drive the entire case as they're trying to do in this case with saying, "Listen, this guy's life was unraveling and this young woman had now essentially started to um extort him to some extent." And I'm not at all casting victim-blaming her, but she was saying, "I want you to do certain things. I want you to be a part of this child's life." She was pregnant. "I want you to you know, I'm going to give the child your name." And he saw, according to prosecutors, his world falling apart, and the way he thought to solve that was just to murder her. Um do you think that's uh been successfully done in this case through the course of all of these text messages that we've read? >> And that's another excellent point. The last case we talked about in North Carolina is all evidence pointing to the connection to the crime and lacking motive. This case is almost all motive and it still kind of lack of of specific evidence specifically proving that it was a murder. Now, obviously, like you said, the prosecutor in this case is going to lean heavily into the motive cuz it is certainly there. Right?

There's no doubt about motive, and there's no doubt about the fact that this was a relationship. I believe she was like 15 or 16 when it started. >> 15, yeah. >> They're going to be able to paint him as not a great guy and the kind of person who might or who would engage in this type of behavior. So, it is interesting. You've got no motive in this case, all motive in this case. Something to keep in mind that you and I learned when we worked at the DA's office about coroner's reports. There is a lot of art as opposed science when the coroners do their reports. It's not like you can just cut a person open and say, "Oh, this person died of a heart attack. This person was strangled. This person had, you know, whatever the case may be." They will, in reaching their conclusion, they'll want to look at They'll want to look at pictures from the crime scene. Sometimes they'll interview witnesses to decide whether or not it was a homicide or whether or not the person died of natural causes or committed suicide. So, in this case, you had, I believe, initially her body was found hung by something from a doorknob. The initial coroner said that they believed it was a suicide. They They later changed their opinion, but just kind of proves the point that, you know, coroners are not It is not a clear scientific conclusion.

They're using circumstantial evidence and witness testam- or witness statements to arrive at what they think is is the most likely conclusion. So, the defense on that case is absolutely going to drive a truck through that hole and say, "The first person who took a look at this case, free of any political pressure, free of any pressure from the police department, prosecutor, or whomever, decided that this was a suicide. And what else do we have other than than their relationship to prove that she died as a result of someone killing her?" That's exactly what they're going to focus on. It's going to be interesting to see how this one plays out. I I think, ultimately, to your point, at the end of the day a case that is strong in terms of the of the DNA and the fingerprints and the proof that is a murder that doesn't have the motive is more likely to succeed than a case that weighs heavily on motive without specific very specific evidence of proof that the person was was killed or murdered. So, this one is going to be interesting to see how this plays out, especially given that I believe the state prosecutor initially declined to pursue charges.

The Feds had to take it. So, in terms of, you know, cases All these cases are very interesting. This one's going to be really interesting to see how the jury comes out on this one. >> Yeah, to your point, it wasn't just the medical examiner that decided this was a case of suicide. It was the investigators and the police and the prosecutors and everybody who took a look at this thing said, "Okay, well, we've got nothing here." And they kind of wiped their hands of it. They said, "Isn't that so sad?" Uh they knew, by the way, that Farwell was the last person to see her alive. It's not like they just discovered that afterwards. They knew they had they in interviewed him. And they the understanding was, "Well, she was a troubled young lady," which there is evidence of that to support. Uh and that she was going through some difficult times. And you know, as sad as it is and kind of as even sometimes as unexpected as it is, you do tragically see people who take their own life. Now, the prosecution, and I think rightfully so, when you really begin to dig into the history that was developing between these two, uh the prosecution on the federal side has said, "Nah-uh. This was not a suicide. This was a staged scene."

So, now they're in a very unique position, and I want to know how you think they should handle that, where they're not only trying to prove the guilt of the defendant, but they're also trying to prove that law enforcement got it wrong, who they are a part of. So, they're saying this were the feds, the state screwed it up. They at worst or at best were lazy and and and uh you know, not thorough. And at worst may have been involved in a cover-up. And we're all kind of on the same team though different and we want you to believe us and not them. >> Yeah, that's the that's that's one of the other fascinating things about this case. Like you said, typically on a murder prosecution, you have the district attorney's office or the Commonwealth or whoever it is working together with the police. You don't usually have a situation where the prosecution is trying to throw the police under the bus or try to cast aspersions on how they handled their investigation. But because of what happened in this case, right? He was essentially cleared like you mentioned the coroner, you mentioned the police and the prosecution at the state level, the federal prosecutors almost have to They don't almost, they have to address that issue. They have to explain the jury why these people whose job it is to investigate crimes and investigate murders who were there on day one at the ground level made the wrong conclusion.

And they can do it one of two ways that you discussed. They can either call them lazy, inept, right? Or they can say this was some hometown cooking. This guy was a local police officer, probably had friends and connect He had friends certainly in the police department who by extension had connections to the local prosecutor and they just kind of rather than taking it the look they should have taken at the case, they just kind of you know, washed their hands of it, let it go. They almost they almost have to do that which um is is a difficult position to be in for this particular case for the reason we just discussed, right? You've got motive up and down, you've got bad conduct up and down, but you don't have the smoking gun that the prosecution in this case can point to to say there's no way this was a suicide. This was clearly a murder. So, you know, it always depends on how the closing arguments go, how the evidence was presented, but that's going to create some problems for the prosecution. They They have to They have to They have to cast aspersions on the investigation that they're using to help prove their case.

>> Yeah. Yeah, it is not as clear-cut as it might seem when you first hear about it, when you start to really dive into the landscape of the evidence. And we'll continue to keep our eyes on that one as well. It's developing, like I said, at a federal court in Massachusetts. Let's finally turn back to our hometown, Los Angeles, where more than 2 years after O.J.'s death, newly unsealed federal documents suggest that Mr. Simpson may have had an accomplice. Though Simpson was acquitted in the 1994 stabbing deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, his so-called confessional memoir also hinted at the possibility of another participant. Mafioso and drug trafficker turned informant, Joey Ippolito, told authorities that he helped dispose of the murder weapon and Simpson's bloody clothes. While this could be seen as tall tales from a man looking for lenient sentencing after escaping from prison, Ippolito was widely considered a highly credible informant. However, according to lead prosecutor Marcia Clark, she was never told about Ippolito's alleged involvement and dismissed his credibility. Due to Simpson's acquittal, the investigation remains active, according to the LAPD.

Now, one of the last men standing is Al Cowlings, a known associate of Ippolito and Simpson's right-hand man, famous for piloting the white Bronco in the low-speed chase seen round the world. Though currently the possibility of additional charges seems incredibly unlikely, the recently unsealed documents uncovered by the Times reignites burning questions in the wake of Simpson's acquittal. Uh R.J., are they ever going to figure out who killed Nicole and and and Ron? >> You know, it's funny. Everyone our generation in particular, OJ is burned into our memory. Even though we weren't full grown adults, we were you know, it was it was Lindy Clancy times a million. >> Yeah. >> On TV, it was what everyone talked about. And the way the case develops, right? It was like, "Oh, OJ's ex-wife was >> And before social media and Twitter and everything else, it would just took over everything. >> 100% and it was the way it unfolded. Like OJ OJ's wife, oh there's a picture of OJ in handcuffs and then they let him go and couple days later some more stories come out that maybe OJ's a suspect and then all of a sudden there's a there's a press conference where there's uh the police have said OJ's going to turn himself in and then a few hours later what? Bronco which is that OJ's on the run and it was it it it consumed you know, media non-stop. I think it was for a year or more.

Um and funny enough, you talked about DNA earlier. DNA was not in the general lexicon in the general knowledge of anyone until that was the first really big case where people talked about DNA evidence. We had the the bloody glove, we had the hat, all that stuff. And there was always these rumors flying around during the case about the way Nicole was killed was suggestive of some kind of organized gang involvement or something like that. I have a feeling Josh, for the rest of my life and the rest of your life and the rest of your listeners' lives, OJ's something with OJ's going to pop up every few years that's going to going to catch our attention because it was such a huge story. You know, it's it's certainly not outside the realm of possibilities that after this happened, if you believe OJ did it, that OJ made a phone call and needed some help. I know LAPD, based on the stories I've read, went to great lengths to try to find that murder weapon. I think they went into it was like the sewage reservoir of LAX or something like that. They were going >> they tore down his home.

>> That's right. >> This is not too long ago in Brentwood and they scoured the entire property looking for anything and I remember they found a knife and we all thought, "Oh my god." And it turned out it was just like some rusty kitchen knife that had been like disposed of somewhere. But I mean they have they have still, like you said, been trying to search for that. >> Yeah, and look, to to Marcia Clark's credit, they were getting tips non-stop during that case while it was pending. So, it's really impossible to know if if A, this made it to her and Chris Darden or B, if it did make it to whether it was vetted or not. And and C, it's it's really hard to know. I I guess this guy has passed away. His brother has given some statements to the press. Is it possible he was involved? Absolutely. We don't know. Ultimately, whether or not this goes to any additional charges, it seems unlikely, but you know, it's it's just I think it speaks to how how much the country was captivated by this case that when these issues pop up, it still gets coverage and people are still interested in it.

>> Yeah. Oh, yeah. I mean, they just recently did that docu- Well, I say recently. I think it was >> Recently for you guys. >> 10 10 years ago or something they did that docu-series that was fantastic, but you know, it was one of the most heavily watched things. It's definitely part of our collective zeitgeist, you know. Um, you and I though we were too far too young when it actually happened, worked in the same prosecutor's office where they famously lost that case and it still hung like a cloud over that office in my view. I mean, people still talked about lessons learned from that case. Um, I I don't even really have a question out of all of [laughter] that. It's just it's just remarkable to me how that case seemed to have still kind of haunted the hallways of the of the criminal court building. >> Look, I think it's always it's interesting to you know, I remember did you ever go on the tour where we got we got to go to like archives where they had like the boxes for the Manson stuff with that.

I remember at one point we it's like for what whoever seen Raiders of the Lost Ark at the end of that movie when Indiana goes through I can't remember where it is and they've got all the old artifacts. >> Huge warehouse, yeah. >> Yeah, that's what this place was like for the LADs. You had like boxes for the Manson murders and I will never forget at the bottom of one of the rows of evidence there was a box labeled OJ's gloves and I tried to sneak over there in front of my buddy and take a picture. We got scolded by the lady doing the tour. So, you know, for criminal law I think in the country but specifically for Southern California, OJ just kind of hangs out there as this thing that just took over. Everyone's kind of took so much space in the media and was such an interesting case from different perspectives. If you are a law and order person, it felt like someone got away with murder. If you're someone who was really concerned about police misconduct and police brutality, you had that aspect of it, too. So, so kind of where you fall on the way the criminal justice system works, if it if it doesn't work, if it does work, whatever it is, there's something about that case that that you can find you can kind of sink your teeth into and find interesting and find compelling, which is why you know, we're going to continue to hear about OJ, I think, going forward as as the year >> I agree. Every time there's some new documentary or something that comes out, I always find a moment to watch it. I've seen all of them, I think, and I still find them to be fascinating.

Um, and maybe someday we will solve the mystery, RJ. Maybe someday we'll know who actually did it. But in the meantime, thank you so much for joining us. Where can people find out more about you? >> Thank you, Josh. They can go to my web my law firm Instagram page which is Dryling Law which is Dryling Law APC. You can find me on LinkedIn and you can also go to my website drylinglawapc.com. >> Fantastic. I'm your host, Joshua Ritter. You can find me on Instagram and Twitter at Joshua Ritter Esq. And if you want to hear my thoughts and coverage on even more true crime cases, please check out my YouTube channel, Courtroom Confidential. And you can, of course, find all of our sidebar episodes wherever you get your podcast. And we would love to hear from you. If you've got questions or comments you'd like us to address, [music] please tweet us your questions with the hashtag TCN Sidebar. And thank you for joining us at the True Crime News Sidebar.