After battling prostate cancer, O.J. Simpson dies away at the age of 76; celebrities in Hollywood respond

O.J. Simpson, the football player and Hollywood actor who was cleared of killing his ex-wife and her friend after a trial that divided the nation over racial issues and police practices in the United States, has passed away. He was seventy-six.

Simpson’s family revealed on his official X account that he passed away on Wednesday due to prostate cancer. According to Las Vegas authorities, he passed away on Thursday.

Through sports and the entertainment industry, Simpson amassed wealth, fame, and admiration, but the knife murders of his ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ronald Goldman in Los Angeles in June 1994 permanently altered his reputation. After being convicted of the killings in a different civil action, he was imprisoned for nine years for other crimes.
In a statement, Goldman’s parents, Fred and Kim, expressed their realisation that “the hope for true accountability has ended.”
“The news of Ron’s killer passing away is a mixed bag of complicated emotions and reminds us that the journey through grief is not linear,” they said.
Several Hollywood celebs expressed their sorrow for his passing on Twitter handles shortly after the news surfaced.

Gloria Allred, who once represented Nicole Brown’s family, provided some further responses. “I feel that the system failed Nicole Brown Simpson and battered women everywhere,” she said to AP News. My grief for O.J. Simpson is not felt. Nicole Brown Simpson and her family deserve to be remembered, and I do grieve for them.
According to NBC News, Marcia Clark, the main prosecutor in Simpson’s murder case, issued a brief statement that said, “I send my condolences to Mr. Simpson’s family.” On Simpson’s defence team, Alan Dershowitz told NBC that he was “upset that he died.” “During the trial, I got to know him fairly well,” he said. It was among the most racially divided trials in American history. He will always be associated with the glove, the Bronco pursuit, and the moment of his acquittal.
During an afternoon briefing, Karine Jean-Pierre, the press secretary for the White House, was questioned about Simpson’s passing. “Obviously, his family and loved ones are in our thoughts during this difficult time,” she added. And let me add this: we will respect their request for privacy, as I am aware that they have made it. I’ll just stop there.
Hall of Fame offensive tackle Joe DeLamielleure, Simpson’s teammate with the Bills, told AP News, “I’m sad because, when people die, you go, ‘Oh, God, that’s terrible.” “He did a lot for the black race, even though he didn’t know it,” DeLamielleure said. He wasn’t Muhammad Ali or anything, but he was making a significant impact on athletics in general, not just black athletes. He also propelled us into a major endeavour. That’s how I see him. He broke new ground.
Live TV footage of Simpson’s arrest during a well-known slow-speed pursuit signalled a dramatic decline in popularity.
As the standout tailback for the dominant University of Southern California in college football in the late 1960s, as a pitchman for rental cars racing through airports in the late 1970s, and as the husband of a blonde and blue-eyed high school homecoming queen in the 1980s, he had seemingly transcended racial barriers.
He used to tell pals, “I’m not black; I’m O.J.”
Live on TV, his trial captivated the interest of Americans. Discussions on racism, gender, domestic violence, celebrity justice, and police misconduct were triggered by this case.
The overwhelming weight of the evidence at the scene looked to go against Simpson. There were bloody footsteps, droplets, and a glove. At his house, another glove that was covered in blood was discovered.
The prosecution urged Simpson to put on the gloves in court, but he declined to testify. Squeezing them into his palms with difficulty, he spoke the trial’s only three words: “They’re too small.”
“If it doesn’t fit, you must acquit,” his lawyer, Johnnie L. Cochran Jr., told the jury.
Although a separate civil trial jury held him accountable for the killings in 1997 and ordered him to pay $33.5 million to the families of Brown and Goldman, the jury in 1995 found him not guilty of murder.
Ten years later, still dogged by the California wrongful death ruling, Simpson led a group of five strangers into a Las Vegas hotel room altercation with two sports memorabilia sellers. Simpson was with two armed guys. Simpson was found guilty by a jury of armed robbery and other offences.
He was 61 years old when he was imprisoned and worked as a gym caretaker for nine years at a distant jail in Nevada. In October 2017, he was freed on parole and showed no remorse. He repeatedly insisted to the parole board that he was only attempting to reclaim artefacts and family heirlooms that had been taken from him during his criminal prosecution in Los Angeles.
“You know, I’ve basically lived a life free of conflict,” Simpson stated before his parole expired in late 2021.
Simpson’s public appeal never subsided. Many argued about whether his acquittal in Los Angeles had resulted in punishment for him in Las Vegas. A five-part ESPN documentary and an FX miniseries both focused on him in 2016.
In 1995, Simpson told The New York Times, “I don’t think most of America believes I did it,” one week after a jury had found him not guilty of killing Brown and Goldman. “I’ve gotten thousands of letters and telegrams from people supporting me.”
Twelve years later, once the public’s fury intensified, Rupert Murdoch called off HarperCollins’s planned book, in which Simpson provided his fictitious version of the murders and was owned by News Corp. The title was going to be “If I Did It.”
The manuscript was taken over by Goldman’s family, who persisted in seeking the multimillion-dollar wrongful death judgement. The book was retitled “If I Did It: Confessions of the Killer.”
“Unfortunately, I had to join the jackals, and it’s all blood money,” Simpson said to The Associated Press at the time. Via a third party, he obtained $880,000 in advance payment for the book.
“It helped me get out of debt and secure my homestead,” he said.
Simpson was taken into custody in Las Vegas, less than two months after the book’s rights were taken away.
Simpson spent nine of his eleven NFL seasons with the Buffalo Bills, where he ran behind “The Electric Company” offensive line and earned the nickname “The Juice.” In his career, he ran for 11,236 yards, scored 76 touchdowns, won four NFL running championships, and was a member of five Pro Bowls. As the first running back to exceed the 2,000-yard rushing mark, he had his greatest season in 1973, rushing for 2,003 yards.
Years later, he said, “I was a part of the history of the game.” “If I did nothing else in my life, I’d made my mark.”
Simpson’s ascent in football occurred along with his career in television. The same evening that he won the 1968 Heisman Trophy, he inked a deal with ABC Sports. He made appearances on the NBC shows “Dragnet” and “Ironside” in the same year. Simpson worked as a colour commentator for ABC for ten years throughout his professional career before moving on to NBC. He started watching “Monday Night Football” on ABC in 1983.
Simpson developed into an engaging salesperson. Hertz selected him as the first black guy for a national corporate advertisement campaign in 1975. The advertisements were all over the place, with Simpson sprinting through airports to get to the Hertz counter and little girls yelling, “Go, O.J., go!”
He acted with Lee Marvin and Richard Burton in the exploitation picture “The Klansman,” which debuted on the big screen in 1974. Despite the movie’s failure, Simpson went on to star in a number of movies and television shows, such as “The Towering Inferno” in 1974, “The Cassandra Crossing” in 1976, “Roots” in 1977, and “Capricorn One” in 1977.
The 1988 film “The Naked Gun: From the Files of the Police Squad” and its two sequels were maybe the most well-known. In the comedic movies, Simpson portrayed Detective Nordberg, playing alongside Leslie Nielsen.
Simpson, of course, achieved other renown.
The fitted tan suit he wore after being found not guilty during his murder trial was one of the artefacts donated and on display at the Newseum in Washington. Simpson was informed that the suit would be in the Las Vegas hotel room, but it was not.
Orenthal James Simpson was raised in government-subsidised housing in San Francisco, where he was born on July 9, 1947.
He spent a year and a half at City College of San Francisco after completing his high school education before moving to the University of Southern California for the spring 1967 semester.
On June 24, 1967, he wed Marguerite Whitley for the first time. The following day, he moved her to Los Angeles to start getting ready for his first season at USC, which went on to win the national title that year largely because of Simpson.
Born the day he received the Heisman Trophy was Arnelle, his first child.
With his first wife, he had two kids, Jason and Aaren. Aaren was killed in a swimming pool accident when he was a baby, and the two of them were divorced in 1979.
In 1985, Simpson and Brown tied the knot. They were divorced in 1992 and had two kids, Justin and Sydney. Nicole Brown Simpson was discovered dead two years later.