The Associated Press
Ken Ritter
LOVELOCK, Nev.–Barring any last-minute snafus, O.J. Simpson will walk out of prison a free man in about three months, having persuaded a Nevada parole board the bungled hotel-room heist he pulled nearly 10 years ago was a monumental error in judgment and one he will never repeat.
Although he still adamantly maintains he was trying to retrieve his personal property when he barged into a hotel room with five other men in September, 2007, he acknowledged repeatedly yesterday that it was something he never should have done.
“I thought I was glad to get my stuff back but it just wasn’t worth it,” he told the board.
“It wasn’t worth it, and I’m sorry.”
After a nationally-televised hearing that clearly revealed the public’s fascination with Simpson continues, four parole commissioners voted unanimously to release him.
“Thank you, thank you, thank you,” he said quietly as he buried his head on his chest with relief.
Then, as he was led down a hall and back to prison, the Hall-of-Fame athlete and 1995 murder defendant raised his hands over his head in a victory gesture and said: “Oh, God, oh!”
Some two hours earlier, Simpson, grey-haired but looking trimmer than he has in recent years, had walked stiffly into a small hearing room of the Lovelock Correctional Center in rural Nevada dressed in jeans, a light-blue prison-issue shirt, and sneakers.
He chuckled as parole board chairwoman Connie Bisbee began the hearing by mistakenly giving his age at 90 before quickly correcting herself.
“Feels like it, though,” Simpson, 70, said as laughter erupted.
Bisbee and three other parole board commissioners were gathered in another hearing room about two hours away in Carson City, the state’s capital.
They questioned Simpson via video.
Several major TV networks and cable channels carried the proceedings live–just as some of them did two decades ago during a famous Ford Bronco chase over Southern California freeways that ended in Simpson’s arrest, and again when a jury in his murder trial returned with its not guilty verdict.
During yesterday’s hearing, the charisma and charm that once made Simpson one of the most popular figures in American pop culture clearly was on display.
By turns remorseful, jovial, and defensive, he heatedly insisted the items he and five others took during the armed robbery in a Las Vegas hotel room in September, 2007 were “my stuff.”
Asked what he planned to do if released, Simpson said he would move to Florida to be close to two of his four adult children.
“I could easily stay in Nevada but I don’t think you guys want me here,” he joked.
At one point, he set off a storm of sarcasm and mockery on social media when, assuring commissioners he would stay out of trouble, he said, “I’ve basically spent a conflict-free life, you know.”
He also insisted he never meant to hurt anyone during the 2007 confrontation, never pointed a gun, and didn’t make any threats during the holdup of two sports memorabilia dealers.
“These were friends of mine, actually guys who helped me move and store some of this stuff,” he said of the dealers, Bruce Fromong and the late Alfred Beardsley.
Fromong testified that was true, adding it was one of the men accompanying Simpson who pointed a gun at him.
“He is a good man. He made a mistake,” Fromong said of Simpson, adding that if Inmate No. 1027820 asks him for a ride from prison when he is released, he will be there.
“I mean that,” he said, turning to face Simpson.
Simpson widely was expected to win parole, given similar cases and his good behaviour behind bars.
