OJ Simpson in action with the Buffalo Bills – from: maximoavance.com
Article by Giovanni Manenti
We are in the early afternoon of Friday 17 June 1994 and American television keeps almost 100 million viewers glued to their screens for what is not a sporting event – despite the fact that on that very day the opening ceremony of the Football World Championships takes place at the “Soldier’s Field” of Chicago – but it has all the appearance of a cinematic shot…
Except it’s not a movie, despite that the protagonist also has a background as an actor, as well as a famous football player in the role of running backagainst whom the police are launching what is defined as one of the most impressive manhunts in the history of the country.
Ma why is OJ Simpson running away…?? He does this to avoid arrest as he had not handed himself in to the police by 11am after a complaint had been made against him. an indictment for the double murder of his ex-wife Nicole Brown and her friend, Ronald Lyle Goldmanhorribly massacred with a knife on the evening of the previous 12 June outside the woman’s home in the Brentwood neighborhood of Los Angeles…
To understand the situation you need to rewind the tape and go to origins of the protagonist, who was born on 9 July 1947 in San Francisco, Californiason of a bank employee and a hospital employee, to whom the name Orenthal James was given with the complicity of an aunt who appreciated a French actor named Orenthalin fact, although the fact is that from a very young age Simpson is called OJ by everyone in the same way, if you remember, as what happened to James Cleveland Owens, the “legendary” sprinter of the 1930s, renamed Jesse due to the pronunciation of the initials JC
Hard to think, but at a very young age Simpson suffered from rickets, forced to wear leg braces, while much more credible is the fact that, despite growing up in a residential neighborhood, can already as a teenager “get noticed” by the Police Force as a member of one of the many street gangsbeing arrested several times, which does not however prevent him from continuing his studies…
But, despite Simpson graduating at the age of 18 from theGalileo High School“, his averages at school certainly do not encourage the most important colleges in the country to focus on him, even though he had already distinguished himself in both the roles of running back and defensive back in high school, an opinion that changes radically after his first positive year at “City College” of San Francisco, with the “University of South California”who he supported as a boy.
The following two years represents the turning point in OJ’s career, who, under the guidance of Coach John McKay, heads the rushing yards ranking in both seasons, with 1,543 in 1967 and with 1,880 the following year, making it an automatic first choice at the Draft for access to the NFL which takes place at the end of January 1969 al “Belmont Plaza Hotel” in New York…
To win the cone performances the Buffalo Bills, a franchise that had won two consecutive AFL titles (1964-’65). (American Football League), with Simpson managing to snatch a pharaonic contract for the time, i.e. 650 thousand dollars for five yearswhich allows him to maintain the already established one more than decently family, having married his historic girlfriend Marguerite at the end of June 1967with whom he had already had a daughter, Arnelle.
A “Star” in the round, Cinema and Television also wink at Simpson, but his start in Pro Football is lower than expected, partly also due to the decisions of his two first coaches in Buffalo, John Rauch and Harvey Johnson, who do not agree in building the team game around the 22 year old from San Francisco, which vice versa happens when the technical guide is assumed Lou Saban…
Here, then, Simpson dominated the scene for a five-year period from 1972 to 1976a period which saw him consecutively included in the “Ideal Team of the Year”, as well as selected for the Pro Bowlor rather a challenge among the best AFC players (American Football Conference) e la NFC (National Football Conference), winning the 1972 and 1973 editions, in the first case also being nominated as MVP of the race.
For six consecutive seasons always present in the “regular season“, Simpson lives his “Year of Glory” in 1973, when establishes three records still unmatched in the history of the NFLor to be the first to run over 1000yds in 7 races and over 2000 (2003 to be precise…) at the end of the Championship, for an extraordinary one average of 143.1yds per gamewhich leads it to be logically awarded NFL MVP for the season…
Now rich and famous, for one “status symbol” like OJ the first marriage – from which Jason was also born in 1970 and Aaren in 1979even though the latter drowns in the family swimming pool at the age of just two years old – begins to go hard, but instead of starting relationships with Hollywood actresses, he begins to frequent the waitress of a nightclub, the unfortunate Nicole Brown, a circumstance that leads to his separation from Marguerite in March 1979.
In the meantime, the competitive activity ends with having his dream of wearing the colors of the legendary San Francisco 49ers, his city’s franchise, was crowneddespite not being able to provide the contribution he would have liked, but this does not mean that Simpson’s income, deriving from film appearances and, above all, from very rich sponsorship contracts, making the most of his amiable personality, combined with his physical appearance and undoubted charisma, so much so that in 1975 the prestigious US magazine “People” defines it as “The first black athlete to become an authentic and lovable media superstar” …
An external image which however does not reflect what happens within the family context, since OJ and Nicole got married at the beginning of February 1985 and, after an apparently happy coexistence, cheered by the birth of Sydney Brooke and Justin Ryan, they begin the problems resulting from the morbid jealousy of the former athlete which leads many, too many times to marital violence.
And, after Simpson himself admitted the abuse in 1989, Nicole decided to ask for a divorce at the end of February 1992, obtaining the same although an attempt at reconciliation was unsuccessfulgiven the now reached limit of mutual tolerance on the part of both…
Thus we arrive at that dramatic evening of June 12, 1994when Nicole had been to dinner at the restaurant “Crescent moon” together with their mother and, upon returning home, they realized that the latter had left her glasses there, so that Ron Goldman, who worked there as a waiter, had offered to bring them back to her.
From here we only know that at 00:10 in the morning the bodies of Nicole and Ron are found barbarously massacred and the investigations are directed almost immediately towards Simpson due to his violent history, convincing the Judiciary to issue an arrest warrant against him…
But while Simpson should hand himself over to the police, he takes a different decision, namely that of escape in a white Ford Bronco owned and driven by his former Buffalo teammate Al Cowlingswith OJ also being armed and threatening to commit suicide several times, which leads to maximum behavioral caution on the part of the Police, until he asks Cowlings to return home and, finally, surrender.
Once the first part of the story is concluded, the second begins in the courtrooms for what the US media are quick to define as “Trial of the Century” (in the same way as the one against the Italian anarchists Sacco and Vanzetti in the 1920s…) for the publicity received at an international level, and which opens on 9 November 1994 with the first hearing to take place on 24 January 1995to end at the beginning of the following month of October…
Soon the defendant’s defense team – made up of a series of the best criminal lawyers so much so that it was defined as a “Dream Team” by the press – focuses on the aspect of racial discrimination given that the evidence was collected by white police officers That “bad digestion” that a black man could be so rich and famous.
A strategy which, together with some uncertainties on the part of the prosecution, pays off in the end given that the verdict of “non guilt” is issued by the Jury in less than four hours of deliberationa duration so short as to amaze industry analysts and which, moreover, leaves the double murder case as one of the most famous among the unsolved ones on American soil…
Be careful, however, because in the United States acquittal in criminal proceedings does not prevent the offended parties (in this case the heirs of the victims…) from establishing a civil case for compensation for damages and the same ended at the beginning of February 1997 with a sentence that overturned the previous verdict and with which OJ Simpson, found guilty of the two murders, comes sentenced to pay a total of 67 million to the two families of dollars.
But there is more, even if the Jury had acquitted Simpson of the criminal charge of murder, the State had certainly not forgotten about him and, on the occasion of a crime of very small proportions, namely burglary in a hotel roomhere it comes at the beginning of December 2008 sentenced to 33 years in prison for robbery and kidnapping, of which the first 9 were without possibility of probation…
After which, in fact, Simpson was released from prison in early October 2017 to serve the remainder of his sentence on probationcertainly a completely different way of living the final part of one’s existence compared to how one would have imagined it during the years of his greatest fame…
“So the glory of the world …”, the Latins warned…, and how can you blame them…
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2023-12-10 19:45:25
#SIMPSON #SUCCESS #GLORY #FALL #AMERICAN #FOOTBALL #STAR #SportHistoria
