Following the civil judgment, he defaulted on the mortgage of his Los Angeles home and the house went into foreclosure. In February 1999, some of his property was seized and auctioned (notably his Heisman trophy) but most of the judgment has not been paid. After the civil suit, he moved to Florida in 2000, which is one of the few states where pensions and residences cannot generally be seized to collect debts.
additional legal issues after the civil suit
* February 2001 – arrested for simple battery and burglary of an occupied conveyance for pulling the glasses off another motorist during a traffic dispute three months earlier. If convicted, he could have faced up to 16 years in prison but he was acquitted of both charges in October 2001
* December 2001 – the FBI searched his home in Florida on suspicion of ecstasy possession and money laundering
* July 2002 – arrested for water speeding through a manatee protection zone and failing to comply with proper boating regulations. The boating charge was later dropped and he was fined for speeding.
* March 2004 – DirecTV accused him of using illegal electronic devices to pirate their broadcast signals and won a $25k judgment plus an additional $33,678 in attorney’s fees
* 2006 – tried to release a book called If I Did It. In September, Ron Goldman’s father filed a lawsuit, claiming that Simpson had received a $1 million advance for the book and a Fox TV interview but had still not paid the civil suit judgment to the two families. In January 2007, a federal judge issued a restraining order forbidding Simpson from spending the advance money. In March, a judge ruled he could not receive any further compensation from the book or Fox interview and ordered the book rights to be auctioned. In August, a Florida bankruptcy court awarded the book rights to the Goldman family to partially satisfy the unpaid civil suit judgment.
* 2007 – state of California said he owed $1.44 million in back taxes (a tax lien was filed in September 1999)
* 2007 – charged with multiple felony counts including criminal conspiracy, kidnapping, assault, robbery, and aggravated assault for a robbery at the Palace Station hotel-casino in Las Vegas. Three co-defendants took plea bargains. Simpson stood trial for 12 counts and pleaded not guilty. He faced a possible life sentence for the kidnapping charge and mandatory time for armed robbery. He was found guilty and sentenced to 33 years in prison. He was released after serving less than nine years and continued to reside in Nevada in a gated golf course community.
After OJ’s death in April 2024, Ron Goldman’s father filed a creditor claim in July 2024, seeking $117 million. The executor of OJ’s estate (his longtime attorney Malcolm LaVergne) announced that he planned to fight the estate’s money going to the Brown and Goldman families. A few months later, LaVergne claimed that OJ owed him $269k at the time of his death and that he was planning to take possession of OJ’s Las Vegas house from OJ’s son Justin to pay off the debt. He then told TMZ that he was attempting to liquidate OJ’s assets to pay off his multiple debts (including the IRS and the California tax board) but that OJ’s family was putting up resistance.
Court documents filed last week state that LaVergne has agreed to pay Goldman but said the original amount did “not appear to be as accurate as possible based on simple judgment interest calculations.” LaVergne told NBC News that the value of Simpson’s estate is $500,000 to $1 million. He said the estate will pay Goldman what it can after administrative expenses and the IRS is paid.
Michaelle Rafferty, Fred Goldman’s attorney, said LaVergne’s acceptance of the claim was a “positive acknowledgement of the debt.” She also clarified: “It does not constitute payment. This acceptance allows the administration of the claim to move forward in probate.”
