LAS VEGAS — O.J. Simpson, the renowned football player and Hollywood actor who was acquitted of murdering his former wife and a friend but found guilty in a separate civil trial, has died. He was 76.
Simpson died of prostate cancer on Wednesday, according to his family, who announced it on his official X account. Simpson’s attorney told TMZ on Thursday that he died in Las Vegas.
Simpson rose to fame, money, and admiration in football and show business, but his legacy was irrevocably altered by the June 1994 knife murders of his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend Ronald Goldman in Los Angeles.
OJ Simpson, Fallen Football Hero Acquitted Of Murder In ‘Trial Of The Century,’ Dies At 76
Live T.V. coverage of his arrest during a historic slow-speed chase signaled a precipitous fall from grace.
He appeared to transcend racial barriers as a star Trojan tailback for the powerful University of Southern California in the late 1960s, a rental car ad pitchman rushing through airports in the late 1970s, and the husband of a blond and blue-eyed high school homecoming queen in the 1980s.
“I’m not Black, I’m O.J.,” he would tell friends.
His “trial of the century” captivated the audience on live television. His case raised discussions about racism, gender, domestic violence, celebrity justice, and police wrongdoing.
A criminal court jury found him not guilty of murder in 1995, but a separate civil trial jury found him accountable for the murders in 1997 and ordered him to pay $33.5 million to Brown and Goldman’s families.
Ten years later, Simpson led five men he hardly knew into a fight with two sports memorabilia dealers in a cramped hotel room in Las Vegas, still troubled by the California wrongful death verdict. Simpson was accompanied by two men armed with firearms. A jury found Simpson guilty of armed robbery and other offenses.
He was imprisoned at the age of 61 and spent nine years in a remote northern Nevada prison, including time as a gym janitor. He was not remorseful when he was freed on parole in October 2017. The parole board heard him argue once more that he was merely seeking to recover sports memorabilia and family heirlooms stolen from him following his criminal trial in Los Angeles.
“I’ve basically spent a conflict-free life, you know,” said Simpson, whose parole expires in late 2021.
The public’s interest in Simpson remained strong. Many people questioned whether he was punished in Las Vegas after his acquittal in Los Angeles. In 2016, he was the focus of a five-part ESPN documentary and an F.X. mini-series.
“I don’t think most of America believes I did it,” Simpson told The New York Times in 1995, a week after a jury ruled he did not murder Brown and Goldman. “I’ve gotten thousands of letters and telegrams from people supporting me.”
Twelve years later, in response to widespread public outcry, Rupert Murdoch shelved a proposed book by News Corp.-owned HarperCollins in which Simpson presented his hypothetical account of the murders. It was supposed to be titled “If I Did It.”
Goldman’s family, which is currently pursuing the multimillion-dollar wrongful death claim, obtained custody of the text. They retitled the book “If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer.”
“It’s all blood money, and unfortunately, I had to join the jackals,” Simpson told the Associated Press at the time. He received $880,000 in advance payments for the book via a third party.
“It helped me get out of debt and secure my homestead,” he told me.
Less than two months after losing the book rights, Simpson was jailed in Las Vegas.
OJ Simpson, Fallen Football Hero Acquitted Of Murder In ‘Trial Of The Century,’ Dies At 76
David Cook, an attorney who has been pursuing the civil judgment in the Goldman case since 2008, said he spoke with Ron’s father, Fred, on Thursday about Simpson’s death. Cook refuses to reveal what Fred Goldman had said or where he was.
“He died without penance,” Cook said of Simpson. “We have yet to learn what he has, where it is, or who is in control. We shall continue from where we are.
Simpson spent nine of his 11 NFL seasons with the Buffalo Bills, earning the nickname “The Juice” as part of an offensive line known as “The Electric Company.” He won four NFL rushing titles, amassed 11,236 yards, scored 76 touchdowns, and appeared in five Pro Bowls. His best season was 1973, when he rushed for 2,003 yards, becoming the first running back to reach that milestone.
“I was a part of the history of the game,” he said years later. “If I did nothing else in my life, I’d made my mark.”
Of course, Simpson went on to achieve more renown.
One of the items from his murder trial, the meticulously fitted tan suit he wore when acquitted, was later donated and displayed at the Newseum in Washington. Simpson was assured that the outfit would be at his hotel room in Las Vegas, but it wasn’t.
Orenthal James Simpson was born in San Francisco on July 9, 1947. He grew up in government-subsidized housing developments.
Following graduation from high school, he attended City College of San Francisco for a year and a half before moving to the University of Southern California for the spring 1967 semester.
He married his first wife, Marguerite Whitley, on June 24, 1967, and moved her to Los Angeles the next day to begin preparation for his first season with USC, which won the national championship that year largely due to Simpson’s contributions.
OJ Simpson, Fallen Football Hero Acquitted Of Murder In ‘Trial Of The Century,’ Dies At 76
Simpson won the Heisman Trophy in 1968. He accepted the statue on the same day as the birth of his first child, Arnelle.
He had two kids with his first wife, Jason and Aaren. One of them, Aaren, drowned as a toddler in a swimming pool accident in 1979, the same year he and Whitley divorced.
Simpson and Brown got married in 1985. They had two kids, Justin and Sydney, and divorced in 1992. Nicole Brown Simpson was found killed two years after she disappeared.
“We don’t need to go back and relive the worst day of our lives,” he told the Associated Press 25 years after the double homicide. “The topic of the moment is one I will never revisit again. My family and I have moved on to the ‘no negative zone.’ We focus on the positives.”
SOURCE – (AP)
