O.J. Simpson found guilty on all charges

[estranged4life]

http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/27010657?GT1=43001

Ex-football star faces prison sentence of 15 years to life over Vegas incident
The Associated Press

LAS VEGAS - O.J. Simpson, who went from American sports idol to celebrity-in-exile after he was acquitted of murder in 1995, was found guilty Friday of robbing two sports-memorabilia dealers at gunpoint in a Las Vegas hotel room.

The 61-year-old former football star could spend the rest of his life in prison. Sentencing was set for Dec. 5.

A weary and somber Simpson released a heavy sigh as the charges were read by the clerk in Clark County District Court. He was immediately taken into custody.

The Hall of Fame football star was convicted of kidnapping, armed robbery and 10 other charges for gathering up five men a year ago and storming into a room at a hotel-casino, where the group seized several game balls, plaques and photos. Prosecutors said two of the men with him were armed; one of them said Simpson asked him to bring a gun.

The verdict came 13 years to the day after Simpson was cleared of murdering his ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson, and her friend, Ronald Goldman, in Los Angeles in one of the most sensational trials of the 20th century.

"I don't like to use the word payback," defense attorney Yale Galanter said. "I can tell you from the beginning my biggest concern ... was whether or not the jury would be able to separate their very strong feelings about Mr. Simpson and judge him fairly and honestly."

Co-defendant also convicted
Simpson's co-defendant, Clarence "C.J." Stewart, 54, also was found guilty on all charges in the Las Vegas case and taken into custody.

Simpson showed little emotion as officers handcuffed him and walked him out of the courtroom. His sister, Carmelita Durio, sobbed behind him in the arms of Simpson's friend, Tom Scotto, who said "I love you" as Simpson passed by. As spectators left the courtroom, Durio collapsed.

Jurors made no eye contact with the defendants as they entered the courtroom. They declined to answer questions after the verdict was read.

Galanter said his client had expected the outcome, and in a courthouse conversation with an Associated Press reporter on Thursday, Simpson had implied as much.

Simpson said he felt melancholy and that he was "afraid that I won't get to go to my kids' college graduations after I managed to get them through college."

Galanter said it was not a happy day for anybody. "His only hope is the appellate process," he said.

Clark County spokesman Dan Kulin said prosecutors would not comment until the case was "completely resolved."


Judge Jackie Glass made no comment other than to thank the jury for its service and to deny motions for the defendants to be released on bail.

She refused to give the lawyers extended time to file a motion for new trial, which under Nevada law must be filed within seven days. The attorneys said they needed time to submit a voluminous record.

"I've sat through the trial," Glass said. "If you want a motion for new trial, send me something."

Appeal promised
Stewart's attorney, Brent Bryson, promised to appeal.

"If there was ever a case that should have been severed in the history of jurisprudence, it's this case," he said of unsuccessful attempts to separate Stewart's case from Simpson's because of the "spillover" effect.


From the beginning, Simpson and his lawyers argued the incident was not a robbery, but an attempt to reclaim mementos that had been stolen from him. He said he did not ask anyone to bring a weapon and did not see any guns.

The defense portrayed Simpson as a victim of shady characters who wanted to make a buck off his famous name, and police officers who saw his arrest as an opportunity to "get" him and avenge his acquittal.

Prosecutors said Simpson's ownership of the memorabilia was irrelevant; it was still a crime to try to take things by force.

"When they went into that room and forced the victims to the far side of the room, pulling out guns and yelling, 'Don't let anybody out of here!' — six very large people detaining these two victims in the room with the intent to take property through force or violence from them — that's kidnapping," prosecutor David Roger said.

Kidnapping is punishable by five years to life in prison. Armed robbery carries a mandatory sentence of at least two years behind bars, and could bring as much as 30.

'Don't let nobody out of this room'
Simpson, who now lives in Miami, did not testify but was heard on a recording of the confrontation screaming that the dealers had stolen his property. "Don't let nobody out of this room," he declared and told the other men to scoop up his items, which included a photo of Simpson with former FBI Director J. Edgar Hoover.

Four other men charged in the case struck plea bargains that saved them from potential prison sentences in return for their testimony. Some of them had criminal records or were otherwise compromised in some way. One, for example, was an alleged pimp who testified he had a revelation from God telling him to take a plea bargain.

Memorabilia dealer Thomas Riccio, who arranged and secretly recorded the hotel-room confrontation, said he netted $210,000 from the media for the tapes.

Similarly, minutes after the Sept. 13, 2007, incident, one of the alleged victims, sports-memorabilia dealer Alfred Beardsley, was calling news outlets, and the other, Bruce Fromong, spoke of getting "big money" from the case.

Shadow of Simpson's past
Simpson's past haunted the case. Las Vegas police officers were heard in the recordings chuckling over Simpson's misfortune and crowing that if Los Angeles couldn't "get" him, they would.

During jury selection, Simpson's lawyers expressed fears that people who believed he got away with murder might see this case as a chance to right a wrong.

As a result, an usually large pool of 500 potential jurors was called, and they were given a 26-page questionnaire. Half were almost instantly eliminated after expressing strong feelings that Simpson should have been convicted of murder.

The judge instructed the jurors to put aside Simpson's earlier case.

In closing arguments, Galanter acknowledged that what Simpson did to recover his memorabilia was not right. "But being stupid, and being frustrated is not being a criminal," he said.

He added: "This case has taken on a life of its own because of Mr. Simpson's involvement. You know that. I know that. Every cooperator, every person who had a gun, every person who had an ulterior motive, every person who signed a book deal, every person who got paid money, the police, the district attorney's office, is only interested in one thing: Mr. Simpson."

© 2008 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.

[gldstwmn]

13 years to the day he was acquitted...justice indeed requires patience.

[Steviefan49]

Originally Posted by gldstwmn

13 years to the day he was acquitted...justice indeed requires patience.

Amen girlfriend... amen..

[vermicious knid]

I remember that one of the jury members from the original trial dismissed a DNA test showing his blood on his driveway by saying "It's not illegal to bleed on your driveway". As if that were the point.

[greatdarkwing]

13 years to the day...13 hours of jury deliberations....Oh justice is sweet...

[estranged4life]

Simpson's luck runs out in Las Vegas

Jury convicts ex-NFL star exactly 13 years after acquittal on murder charges

The Associated Press

LAS VEGAS - In a city where luck means everything, O.J. Simpson came out the big loser — and his unlucky number in a case full of bizarre twists was 13.

He was convicted of an armed robbery that happened on Sept. 13 and was found guilty on the 13th anniversary of his Los Angeles murder acquittal. The Las Vegas jury deliberated for 13 hours after a 13-day trial.

And then, as only the racking sobs of Simpson’s sister broke the silence late Friday, the lights went out.

Court marshals flipped on flashlights and shouted for everyone to stay seated. Only the judge knew what had happened. It was 11 p.m. and the courthouse lights had shut down automatically.

“Timed out,” Judge Jackie Glass said in a fitting epitaph for the story of O.J. Simpson.

The 61-year-old Hall of Fame football star was convicted of kidnapping, armed robbery and 10 other charges for gathering five men a year ago and storming into a room at a hotel-casino, where the group seized several game balls, plaques and photos. Prosecutors said two of the men with him were armed; one of them said Simpson asked him to bring a gun.

Simpson could face life behind bars
Once convicted, Simpson, the sports-idol-turned-celebrity-pariah, was handcuffed and led from the room with his co-defendant, Clarence “C.J.” Stewart. They could spend the rest of their lives in prison.

“There is justice,” said attorney Gloria Allred, who has represented the family of his slain ex-wife, Nicole Brown Simpson. “Justice was delayed, but in this case it was not denied. Now that he may spend the rest of his life in prison, the law, and not O.J. Simpson, will have the last word.”

Still, many of those in the courtroom couldn’t believe the verdicts. Simpson’s sister, Carmelita Durio, fainted. The sister of Tom Scotto, whose wedding precipitated the hotel confrontation, wailed. His wife, Sabrina, wept.

Some observers said the Las Vegas case paled in comparison to the “trial of the century” in 1995, a yearlong opus in which Simpson was acquitted of murdering his ex-wife and her friend Ronald Goldman.

A rapt nation followed the Los Angeles trial. Tales of a gruesome murder and a bloody glove, as well as the celebrity defendant, drew a media frenzy.

In Las Vegas, Simpson’s fate played out in a small courtroom dotted with empty seats. Even the stunning verdict came as most of America slept, oblivious to the irony that Simpson might spend the rest of his life in prison for what most perceived as a petty crime, a tussle among middle-aged men.

Simpson’s Las Vegas defense tried to tell the jury that the two cases had nothing to do with each other, but it was a losing battle.


“I don’t know that one trial cancels out the other,” said Loyola University law professor Laurie Levenson, who attended Simpson’s murder trial. “People will always be troubled by O.J. For the people troubled by the Los Angeles acquittal, this case will make small amends. Saying finally there is justice, at least from a legal perspective, is very crude way of looking at justice.”

She predicted that Stewart, 54, will have a strong chance for reversal on appeal because he was forced to stand trial beside Simpson.

“O.J. was toxic, and he has been toxic since 1994, and this jury was just ready to clean up the mess,” Levenson said.


'This was just payback'
Simpson lawyer Yale Galanter said Saturday he felt bad for Simpson but even worse for Stewart, who got dragged along in a campaign to convict Simpson.

“This was just payback,” he said of the verdict. “They were on an agenda.”

Galanter and Stewart’s lawyers promised to appeal, in part because unlike the predominantly black jury that decided Simpson’s murder case, this panel included no African-Americans. Neither Simpson nor Stewart testified.

Tom Scotto, who wept in court, called it “a public lynching.”

“Was this something to put someone in jail for the rest of their life for? It’s a total injustice. There was no justice served in that courtroom,” Scotto said.

It was Scotto’s wedding that had brought Simpson, a close friend, to Las Vegas on that fateful week in 2007, and details of wedding plans, flowers, a cake and parties formed an ironic counterpoint to testimony about Simpson gathering up a posse that included two gun-toting men to confront memorabilia dealers who were peddling Simpson’s personal property to the highest bidder.

The case was set in motion by Thomas Riccio, a collectibles broker who tried to bring in the FBI when he heard that two memorabilia dealers were planning to sell a trove of Simpson artifacts. Failing to get their attention, he helped set up a “sting” by promoting an anonymous buyer who turned out to be Simpson.

Riccio, who has peddled goods including video of Anna Nicole Smith’s breast implant surgery, saw a chance to profit by recording the confrontation between Simpson and collectibles dealers Alfred Beardsley and Bruce Fromong.

He rented a cramped hotel room away from the Las Vegas Strip for the meeting and planted a digital recorder atop an armoire. Riccio then sold the recordings of the six-minute confrontation for $210,000 before turning them over to police eight days later. Although they couldn’t be authenticated, the recordings became the heart of the prosecution’s case, along with audio recorded by gunman Michael McClinton at two wedding parties.

The recordings were sometimes garbled, but Simpson’s voice came through loud and clear: “Don’t let nobody out of this room.” The words formed the basis of the prosecution’s kidnapping charge.


The former football hero also was heard accusing the men of stealing his possessions. His lawyer would argue that Simpson was on a recovery mission to reclaim the artifacts of his life.

Sentencing is Dec. 5
But District Attorney David Roger argued that ownership was not a defense to robbery.

Kidnapping is punishable by five years to life in prison. Armed robbery carries a sentence of at least two years behind bars and could bring as much as 30.

Simpson and Stewart were taken to the Clark County jail, where the football star will live in a 7-by-14-foot cell, far removed from his ranch-style home in the lush Miami suburbs.

The once-gregarious entertainer doesn’t have a cell mate. He lives in the company of white concrete block walls, a small toilet and sink, and a wooden bed covered with a thin cushion. He probably has a view of a scruffy Las Vegas street through two slit windows.

It will be his home until at least Dec. 5, when he and Stewart are scheduled to be sentenced. They would then be sent to state prison.

Even before the verdict, Simpson appeared resigned that his luck had run out.

He had been prepared for the worst, his lawyer said.

And in a conversation with The Associated Press on Thursday, Simpson implied as much, saying, “I’m afraid that I won’t get to go to my kids’ college graduations after I managed to get them through college.”

[Mad4stevie]

Thank God!

I hope the judge throws the book at him! She is quite a no-nonsense kind of judge and keeps tight control in the courtroom. Hopefully, she will be just as strict with sentencing.

[omigodstevie]

OOh, karma. How I love you so

[Gypsy-Rhiannon]

Karma is a bitch!

[SuzeQuze]

Originally Posted by vermicious knid

I remember that one of the jury members from the original trial dismissed a DNA test showing his blood on his driveway by saying "It's not illegal to bleed on your driveway". As if that were the point.

The defense did a good job of picking idiots for the jury.

[greatdarkwing]

Originally Posted by SuzeQuze

The defense did a good job of picking idiots for the jury.

I'm curious as to what their grounds for appeal will be

[Steviefan49]

Originally Posted by SuzeQuze

The defense did a good job of picking idiots for the jury.

Good one Susan! Boy is that an understatement... but this time, his luck and money played out, and justice prevailed.. You know his poor ex-wife in heaven is high-fiving everyone up there, as well as her family here!

[Lee]

what goes around comes around.

I hope he never gets out of prison.

Lee

[estranged4life]

Knowing the judicial system of this country, even if OJ is sentenced to life he will have it easy in prison - more than likely incarcerated at a minimum security prison and/or being kept away from the general population...

Basically a slap on the wrist (Like MOST celebrities receive when JAIL is involved...I personally think they should HAVE to take THEIR CHANCES in GENERAL POPULATION just like ANY ONE ELSE)

[Musicman408]

Glad he will finally get some punishment. Karma is a biznitch.