Apparently upset that he no longer gets wall-to-wall TV coverage, O.J. Simpson has his lawyer shopping him around for TV and print interviews for the upcoming 10th anniversary of his wife's brutal murder (via The Corner):

"It will be expensive," [Star Magazine] quotes [attorney Yale]Galanter. "TV rights are going for $100,000. For print rights, between $20,000 and $25,000."

Nothing if not classy, Galanter adds that O.J. might even be willing to do a photo shoot at the Brentwood crime scene and at Nicole's grave site - if the price is right.

"It would have to be a multimillion-type deal," Galanter says. A grave site photo would be "worth $500,000 ... Our preference is a standard interview ... but it's just money."

Simpson, of course, has a $33 million judgement against him from Fred Goldman, the father of the other victim of the slaying that mesmerized a nation and made Geraldo Rivera relevant again. O.J. lost the civil suit filed by the families of the victims after the jury allowed Johnny Cochran to talk them into a stupor. Not that he found it all that difficult, either, as books by Vincent Bugliosi (who prosecuted Charles Manson and his "Family") and Daniel Petrocelli, Goldman's lawyer, make clear. The prosecution, while well-intentioned, stumbled through this case from beginning to end, and they weren't helped by the hopelessly camera-drunk Judge Lance Ito.

Now Simpson looks to generate some cash with which to pay off that judgement, although I suspect he intends to hold onto as much as he can, by cashing in on the corpses of his victims, and on national TV and media if he can do it. I doubt he'll find many takers, though. The last time the Juice(r) sold an interview, it was with media behemoth BET. In a polarized society, one thing most of us finally agree on is that Simpson killed those two people and played the system to get off, and most people are profoundly uninterested in paying Simpson to hear more BS about his innocence. Besides, he's supposed to get back to his unending search for the "real killers", isn't he?

As an Angeleno, I'm amazed that ten years has gone by; the murder occurred shortly after the First Mate and I were married. If you didn't live in LA during the Simpson soap opera, you have no idea how insane life became during the trial. Not only did it seem that Simpson was the only thing on TV, it was the only thing we talked about for over a year. When Marcia Clark changed her haircut, it not only made for front-page news, people wrote editorials about it. In one way, I'm glad that blogging was non-existent back then or I may have gone completely insane. For an area that had just been torn apart by the King riots, the trials did little to soften the divide between the black and white communities, and because Ron Goldman and his family were Jewish, we experienced more anti-Semitic rhetoric in Los Angeles than I had ever heard, before or since cumulatively.

I don't need to see Simpson again. The memories stay with me, and they're far from pleasant.

Trackback Pings

TrackBack URL for this entry is

Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Hey, Juice, It's All Going To Fred Anyway:

» Go Back Under Your Rock from The Resplendent Mango
Captain's Quarters writes about the ever-graceful OJ Simpson's attempts to secure large sums of money in exchange for his giving interviews, tastefully shot at Nicole's grave, or perhaps the murder scene. OJ, heres some free advice for you. [Read More]

Tracked on May 28, 2004 9:19 AM