Police arrested O.J. Simpson on Sunday, saying he was part of an armed group who burst into a Las Vegas hotel room and snatched sports memorabilia that documented his own sports career, long ago eclipsed by scandal.
The arrest starts a new legal odyssey for Simpson, the fallen football star who more than a decade ago in 1995 was acquitted of the slayings of his ex-wife and a friend, and opens the possibility he could spend decades behind bars.
Simpson’s mug shot in 1994
Simpson was taken away from The Palms hotel-casino by plainclothes officers a day after the arrest of a golfing buddy who police say accompanied Simpson with a gun in the Thursday night holdup. Handcuffed and wearing a golf shirt and jeans, Simpson was placed in an SUV.
“He was very cooperative, there were no issues,” Capt. James Dillon said.
Simpson was being booked Sunday night on two counts of robbery with a deadly weapon, two counts of assault with a deadly weapon, conspiracy to commit a crime and burglary with a firearm, police said. The district attorney, meanwhile, said he expected Simpson to ultimately be charged with seven felonies and one gross misdemeanor.
A judge ordered Simpson be held without bail, said Sgt. John Loretto. A court date was set for Thursday.
If convicted of the booking charges, Simpson would face up to 30 years in state prison on each robbery count alone.
Simpson, 60, has said he and other people were retrieving items that belonged to him. Simpson has said there were no guns involved and that he went to the room at the Palace Station casino only to get stolen mementos that included his Hall of Fame certificate and a picture of the running back with J. Edgar Hoover.
Back in the 90s, the O.J. Simpson murder case was a highly-publicized U.S. criminal trial in which Simpson, the former American football star was acquitted in the murders of his former wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman, later a civil court jury found Simpson responsible for the deaths and ordered him to pay $33.5 million in damages to their families. Simpson has had to auction off his sports collectibles, including his Heisman Trophy, to pay some of the $33.5 million judgment awarded in the civil trial.
Well, anyone that followed the O.J. Simpson & Nicole Brown case back then would probably want Simpson to be put in the clink!
