O.J. Simpson rose to fame on the football field, became the first black American to make a fortune in movies, advertising and television, and was acquitted of murdering his ex-wife and her friend in a 1995 trial in Los Angeles that captivated the nation. became. He passed away on Wednesday. He was 76 years old.
Cause: cancer, family announced on social media. The announcement did not say where he died.
The jury in this murder trial held up a cracked mirror to black-and-white America and acquitted Mr. Simpson, but the case ruined his world. In 1997, a civil suit by the victims' families found him responsible for the deaths of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald L. Goldman and ordered him to pay $33.5 million in damages. He barely paid off his debts, moved to Florida, and struggled to rebuild his life, raise his children, and stay out of trouble.
In 2006, he sold a book manuscript, If I Did It, and scheduled television interviews in which he spoke of a “hypothesis” about the murders he had always denied committing. Both projects were canceled due to public outcry, but Mr. Goldman's family secured the rights to the book and had it published with additional material incriminating Mr. Simpson.
In 2007, he was arrested after he and other men broke into a sports memorabilia dealer's room at a Las Vegas hotel and stole a trove of collectibles. He claimed the items were stolen from him, but in 2008 a jury, attended by only a handful of reporters and observers, found him guilty of 12 charges, including armed robbery and kidnapping. I put it down. He was sentenced to 9 to 33 years in Nevada State Prison. He served the minimum term and was released in 2017.
For years, O.J. Simpson's story has become a tell-all book, revolving around issues of justice, race relations, and celebrity, in a country that worships heroes, especially those cast into the penniless-to-rich stereotype. It sparked a wave of films, research, and debate. However, I could not be satisfied with the deep contradiction.
A full obituary will be published soon.