O.J. TAKES A STAB AT FREEDOM
Parole hearing a global event
O.J. Simpson hasn’t gotten this much TV coverage since the Ford Bronco chase.
Nearly a quarter-century after his slowspeed police chase in the SUV was televised live to captivated viewers around the world, the former grid great will land before the cameras again Thursday — this time from the Nevada prison he has called home for almost nine years after an armed-robbery conviction.
Simpson, 70, is set to appear via closedcircuit TV before a parole board in Carson City at 1 p.m. New York time to learn whether he’ll be set free.
His appearance will air live, with major news outlets covering the spectacle.
Offering up “analysis’’ from the sidelines will be major players in Simpson’s past. They include Mark Fuhrman, the former LA detective who was first at the scene of the infamous 1994 case involving the murders of Simpson’s ex-wife Nicole Brown Simpson and her friend Ron Goldman.
O.J. was acquitted of the brutal slayings in 1995 but, at a 1997 civil trial, was found liable for the deaths.
Goldman’s father and sister will be interviewed during the coverage, as will lawyers for Brown Simpson’s family.
O.J. — looking a far cry from his Heisman Trophy-winning days with a graying, balding dome and stomach paunch — will make his plea for parole from behind the walls of Lovelock Correctional Center, about 130 miles from the actual board, which meets in Carson City.
But more than a dozen friends and family members said they’ll represent him in the room where board members meet.
They include his lawyer, Malcolm La Vergne, daughter Arnelle Simpson and sister Shirley Baker.
Also in attendance will be Tom Scotto, whose 2007 wedding Simpson was set to attend the weekend of the botched armed robbery of sports trophies, family photos and game-used footballs.
Simpson could walk out of prison a free man later this year if he can convince four parole-board members that he’s remorseful and poses no threat to society.
The pro-football Hall of Famer has been known as Inmate No. 1027820 since 2008, when he was convicted of leading an armed crew into a Las Vegas hotel room and stealing a boatload of sports memorabilia in September 2007.
He has served more than eight years of a nine- to 33-year sentence.
The parole board will consider several factors in deciding whether Simpson could be released as early as Oct. 1.
It will weigh his age, behavior behind bars, criminal record and whether he poses a threat to public safety.
The four board members will have to reach a unanimous decision.
If they can’t all agree one way or another, they’ll pull in three more parole-board members who will have been monitoing the hearing just in case. At that point, only a majority opinion would be needed.
A ruling is expected soon after the conclusion of the hearing.
Tipping in Simpson’s favor is his clean prison record. He also was already granted parole on some of the 12 charges by the same commissioners in 2013 before he reached eligibility for release.
He claimed at that hearing that he was just trying to get back his own property.
But “make no mistake, I would give it all back to get these last five years back,” he said in 2013.
Simpson has been of a model prisoner — resolving inmate disputes, serving as the prison’s unofficial “athletic director,” leading prayer groups and even lobbying for inmate- education funding, according to Nevada state Assemblyman Osvaldo Fumo, who worked on Simpson’s failed appeal of his conviction.
“I think he’s going to be released. I think his case looks good,” said Los Angeles criminal-defense lawyer Alaleh Kamran, who has practiced in Nevada.
The board will also be guided by parolehearing and risk-assessment reports that have not yet been made public.
Those documents will contain information on Simpson’s mental state, cooperation level while in prison and chance of recidivism if he’s released, Kamran said.
Retired Clark County DA David Roger, who put Simpson away, said earlier this month that he believes O.J. deserves parole and will probably get it.
Simpson beat the double-murder rap in the June 12, 1994, slayings of Brown Simpson and Goldman.
He was arrested on June 17 that year after leading cops in a chase around Southern California in the white Ford Bronco driven by pal Al Cowlings.
His acquittal on Oct. 3, 1995, could come back to haunt him at the parole proceeding, one legal expert said.
“What plays against him is the ghost of the murders,” said Loyola Marymount Law Professor Laurie Levenson. “What we don’t know is how much the O.J. factor will make a difference.”
Walter Alexander, one of Simpson’s 2008 co-defendants who got probation for bringing a gun into Room 1203 of the Palace Station Hotel & Casino, accused Nevada prosecutors of targeting The Juice simply over the 1994 murder case.
Simpson is “in [prison in Nevada] for the murders they think he did,” Alexander told The Post recently. “[Otherwise,] if you did the same crime we did, then you would have gotten probation — at the worst.