OJ may walk free as early as October
New Delhi, Feb. 26: O.J. Simpson, the former American football star who is doing time for a string of charges following an armed robbery in Las Vegas in 2007, could walk free from jail in a few months after serving less than a third of his sentence.
A parole board hearing in the summer is expected to recommend the release based on good behaviour. If the board votes in his favour, Simpson, 69, could be released as early as October, exactly nine years into his 33-year sentence.
Simpson needs to secure recommendations from at least four of the seven commissioners at the hearing, something Las Vegas criminal defence attorney Daniel Hill said he is confident of.
“He’s the kind of person who gets paroled,” Mr Hill told the Daily Express. “He has done a significant amount of time and, by all accounts, hasn’t caused any problems.”
Simpson was controversially cleared of the brutal murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown and her lover Ron Goldman in 1995, in what was dubbed the “Trial of the Century”.
Simpson reportedly receives £20,000 a month as pension from NFL, and will have around £2.16 million by the time of his release. His creditors won’t be able to touch this money.
However, he was later found liable for the two deaths as a result of a lawsuit filed in civil court in 1997 and was ordered to pay around £25m to the families of Brown and Goldman. The families claim they have seen only a “mere fraction” of the amount.
In 2008, Simpson was found guilty of 12 counts including kidnapping, robbery and assault with a deadly weapon after he and a group of accomplices robbed nearly 800 items of sports memorabilia from collectors Alfred Beardsley and Bruce Fromong in a Las Vegas hotel in September 2007. He is serving his 33-year sentence at Lovelock Correctional Centre in Nevada.
Nicknamed “The Juice”, Simpson is reported to have amassed a fortune while behind bars thanks to his National Football League pension. Simpson reportedly receives £20,000 a month and will have an estimated fortune of £2.16 million by the time of his expected release. Under America’s Employee Retirement Income Security Act, the fund can’t be touched by creditors.