Well, judge for yourself:
Dan Glaister in Los Angeles
Monday September 17, 2007
The Guardian
OJ Simpson faces a lengthy prison term if he is convicted after his arrest yesterday for allegedly being involved in an armed robbery to retrieve what he claims were his personal belongings from a sports memorabilia seller.
The former American football star and actor, who was controversially acquitted of the murder of his ex-wife and her friend in 1994, faces two charges of robbery with the use of a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit robbery, burglary with a deadly weapon, two counts of assault with a deadly weapon and coercion. If he is found guilty, each charge of robbery with a deadly weapon carries a jail sentence of between three and 35 years.
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Among the items allegedly being sold from a room at the Palace Station hotel and casino in Las Vegas last Thursday were the suit Simpson wore the day he was acquitted and a photograph of Simpson with the former FBI director J Edgar Hoover.
An auctioneer friend of Simpson's who had been contacted about the items became suspicious of their provenance. He alerted Simpson who decided to accompany the auctioneer to a viewing. Simpson, however, arrived with six or seven friends. It is alleged that at least one person in the party had a firearm.
According to witnesses, the situation quickly descended into chaos. "Simpson was supposed to show up, identify the items and tell the men to either give the stuff back or he would call the police," the auctioneer, Thomas Riccio, told the Los Angeles Times. "OJ got really emotional and things got kind of nutty."
After the group had left, the two sellers, Bruce Fromong and Alfred Beardsley, a former associate of Simpson's called the police to report an armed robbery.
Simpson, holding court by the pool at the Palms hotel in Las Vegas on Saturday evening, denied that he was guilty of any wrongdoing. "I'm OJ Simpson," he said. "How am I going to think that I'm going to rob somebody and get away with it? This is somebody going to get his private [belongings] back. That's it. That's not robbery."
He also denied that the people who accompanied him were criminals. "I don't hang out with gangsters," he said. "I hang out with golfers."
Las Vegas police, however, are taking the matter seriously and were holding the former football star pending the arrival of his lawyer last night.
The incident came at the end of a tumultuous week for Simpson and those affected by him. On Wednesday If I Did It: Confessions of a Killer, his controversial hypothetical account of the killings of Nicole Brown Simpson and Ronald Goldman, was published. But instead of the profits going to Simpson and Rupert Murdoch's News Corp, as had originally been envisioned, it was published by a small vanity press, Beaufort Books, and the Goldman family.
The Vegas incident is far from Simpson's first brush with the law since he was acquitted of the murders but later found responsible for the deaths in a civil case. He has been accused of assaulting a photographer, received a $130 speeding ticket for driving his speedboat too fast through a Florida manatee zone, has been investigated in connection with the pirating of satellite television signals, questioned by police following a domestic incident reported by his girlfriend and investigated in connection with a money-laundering scheme and a drugs ring. He was acquitted, however, on road rage charges.
His latest run-in could prove his most serious. "He is facing a lot of time," the Clark county district attorney, David Roger, told reporters.
http://film.guardian.co.uk/news/stor...170961,00.html
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