OJ wants millions for TV interview
UNITED STATES: OJ Simpson was expected to ask for about US$5 million (NZ$7M) for a first interview as a free man after he was released from a prison in Nevada early yesterday.
After spending nine years behind bars for a botched armed robbery in a Las Vegas casino the former American football star, 70, strode out of the Lovelock Correctional Centre at eight minutes past midnight.
‘‘I told him, ‘Don’t come back’, and he responded, ‘I don’t intend to’ ... He was upbeat, personable and seemed happy to get on with his life,’’ a prison official told CNN.
Simpson’s team is said to have approached America’s TV channels to gauge interest in a paid interview. He was expected to ask for between US$3 million and US$5 million to speak about his time in prison and also, presumably, the sensational 1995 trial in which he was acquitted of the murders of Nicole Brown Simpson, his ex-wife, and her friend Ronald Goldman.
‘‘He’s only going to do it one time and it has to be worth his while,’’ a confidant told the New York Post.
Many TV networks do not pay for interviews but they often give money to use photographs and video content. It was not clear, however, that Simpson would find any takers.
In 1997 Simpson was ruled liable for the murders of Brown Simpson, 35, and Goldman, 25, in a civil court and ordered to pay the victims’ families US$33.5 million. That sum remains outstanding and the Goldman family has said that it will pursue him for US$65 million, which includes interest.
Simpson told a parole board that he hoped to live in Florida, where he has family. ‘‘I basically have spent a conflictfree life,’’ he said. ‘‘I’ve always been a guy that got along with everybody.’’
Pam Bondi, the Florida attorneygeneral, said that he would not be welcome. ‘‘Floridians are well aware of Simpson’s background, his wanton disregard for the lives of others, and of his scofflaw attitude with respect to the heinous acts for which he has been found civilly liable,’’ she wrote. ‘‘The spectre of his residing in Florida should not be an option.’’ - The Times