O.J. Simpson biography

Simpson and Brown married in 1985 and had two children together.

Nicole Brown Simpson often complained about her marriage to friends and family members, telling them that O.J. was physically abusive and frequently beat her, though he denied ever hitting her. She filed for divorce in 1992.

On June 12, 1994, the bodies of Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend, Ronald Goldman,

were found stabbed to death outside of her condominium in Los Angeles' Brentwood area. When evidence led police to suspect Simpson of the murder, he fled (with a disguise and a passport) in his Bronco in a nationally televised slow-speed chase seen. Simpson finally surrendered voluntarily at his mansion, located on L.A.'s Rockingham Avenue.

Later, Simpson pleaded "absolutely, positively, 100 percent not guilty" to the murder charges. His criminal trial, often characterized as "the trial of the century," ended on October 3, 1995, with a jury finding him not guilty of either murder.

Trouble with the Law

Despite his aquittal in a criminal court, in 1997, a civil jury found Simpson liable for the wrongful death of his Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, and ordered him to pay $33 million in damages.

Simpson was planning to publish If I Did It—a hypothetical account of how he would have committed the Brown Simpson/Goldman murders—in late 2006, but after a publishing deal fell through, a federal bankruptcy judge awarded the book's rights to the family of Ronald Goldman. The Goldman family added commentary to the work and re-titled it If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer; the book was published on September 12, 2007.

In October 2008, O.J. Simpson was convicted on 12 counts of armed robbery and kidnapping, along with Clarence Stewart. The two men were found guilty of robbing two sports memorabilia dealers at gunpoint in a Las Vegas hotel room in 2007. Simpson, who was immediately taken into custody, told police that he had just been trying to reclaim his possessions.

In December 2008, Simpson and Stewart were sentenced to 33 years in prison, with the possibility of parole after nine years. The sentencing came exactly 13 years to the day after Simpson was acquitted of the Brown Simpson/Goldman murders. Simpson is currently serving his sentence at the Lovelock Correctional Center in Lovelock, Nevada.

In May 2013, it was reported that Simpson was seeking a new trial to reinvestigate his robbery/kidnapping charges, claiming that one of his attorneys, Yale Galanter, had given him poor advice during his 2008 trial. "It was my stuff. I followed what I thought was the law," the former running back testified on May 15, 2013, in a Las Vegas courtroom. "My lawyer told me I couldn't break into a guy's room. I didn't break into anybody's room. I didn't try to muscle guys. The guys had my stuff, even though they claimed they didn't steal it." Whether Simpson will be granted a retrial is reportedly the decision of Judge Linda Marie Bell, not of a jury.

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